Accidents pile up: Tobogganing carries the danger with it

While in adults, especially leg injuries are the result of toboggan accidents, in children, the head is primarily at risk. Therefore, wearing a hard hat can be life-saving. Otherwise, bring reflective tapes on hands.

In Tirol, an average of 300 people injures each other while sledding so hard that they have to be treated in the hospital.

The sledding accidents of last week in Tirol and South Tirol were shown how quickly a harmless winter fun can turn into bitter and sad seriousness. A particularly tragic end took, as reported, a sleigh ride on the Bitten, in which a mother with her eight-year-old daughter hit a tree. The woman was seriously injured, the child was dead on the spot. In Mature on New Year's Day, a 60-year-old woman had hit a lantern and suffered leg injuries as well as a 30-year-old German a day later in Virgin when he drove against a wooden gang. On Thursday afternoon, a seven-year-old girl from Italy finally injured her back after losing control of his sled on a sledding hill in Seinfeld.

While in adults especially the lower extremities are particularly endangered in toboggan accidents, it is the head of children, says Claudius Thomism, director of the Univ.-Clinic for Neurosurgery in Innsbruck. "When tobogganing, you can easily reach 30 to 40 kilometers per hour. However, if you hit your head against a stationary obstacle, then 15 to 20 km / h can be dangerous. "The reason for this is the enormous forces acting on the skull during an unrestrained impact. "The brain is suddenly decelerated quickly. And because of these forces, the brain can tear itself in, "explains Thomism. Hemorrhages between the meninges and bones can also lead to delayed complications leading to death. The helmet should, therefore, be standard equipment for tobogganing for adults, but especially for children, says the physician. Finally, this distributes the impact forces on a larger area and thus protects the underlying head. "I'm not usually a big friend of duties. But sledding would make me want to wear helmets, "says Thomism.

How important the right equipment, and especially the wearing of a helmet while sledding is, it is also referred to the Board of Trustees for traffic safety. One should not understand tobogganing as a child-friendly winter program, but as a thoroughly demanding sport, which also depends on the right steering and braking technology.

For an accident-free tobogganing pleasure, the Austrian Alpine Club recommends sturdy shoes next to the helmet and a headlamp and reflective clothing with reflective materials in the dark. On toboggan runs, you should do without plastic bobs.