The Ski Helmet Debate

ise wrote:

The problem here is you've got one group of people who are convinced wearing a helmet prevents a likely fatal injury and another group who've correctly assessed that sort of accident is unlikely.

Mike Langran has a balanced view I think if you read his comments about Natasha Richardson.

Gooseh wrote: You seem to assume everyone wearing a helmet is under the impression that it's likely to save their lives.

Gooseh wrote:When the payoff is so great, though, why not wear one?

ise wrote:

stevesmoothie wrote:Natasha Richardson's fatal accident was enough for me. What if you had a fall on a rock hard icy patch . . .

Bottom line is snow sports ARE dangerous sports and it seems obvious to wear protection.

Actually here's the bottom line..

if you think snow sports are dangerous then according to the statistics football must be positively suicidal!!

Dr Mike Langran, UK National Secretary for both the International Society for Skiing Safety and SITEMSH (The International Society for Skiing Traumatology and Winter Sports Medicine)

- skiing isn't a dangerous sport, overall injury rates is 0.2-0.4%, football runs around 14% for example

- Natasha Richardson died from bleed caused by a blunt trauma, it's not clear a helmet would help. The actual odds of death from an accident on the slopes is approximately 1 in 1.5 million. Mike Langran has comment on this accident : http://www.ski-injury.com/latest_news/nr there's a lot of other interesting stuff on his site.

We all get something called a cognitive bias, there's many sorts and this is specifically an availability heuristic. That's the perception of the odds of something occurring is based on being able to recall a vivid example of it. Publicized accidents like that tend to push us into that trap.

Some of the other comments from above :

I always wear a helmet, keeps me protected from the nutters out there! It might well do but that's not much use, most accidents involve only one person.
I don't ski steep stuff so I really won't bother that's unfortunate, it's much safer on steep stuff. Most accidents occur at lower speeds on easier runs.
I would guess that the most common ski injury is thumbs and hamstrings and knees .. actually, that's perfectly correct )
I would like to see the statistics of serious head injuries on the slopes before I make any considered judgement try http://www.ski-injury.com but serious head injuries are rare and in many cases a helmet wouldn't help at all.

The problem here is you've got one group of people who are convinced wearing a helmet prevents a likely fatal injury and another group who've correctly assessed that sort of accident is unlikely.

Mike Langran has a balanced view I think if you read his comments about Natasha Richardson.

ise wrote:

Gooseh wrote:When the payoff is so great, though, why not wear one?

As it happens I do wear a helmet ) But that's just the lottery argument isn't it? The payoff of winning is so great why wouldn't you buy a ticket? ) The trouble is it doesn't shine a lot of light on things, you could fall on the pavement and bang your head, people do, but by and large we're not going to wear a helmet so you know it's nothing like that simple.

ATOO wrote:I look a total twiat wearing mine and wish I didn't feel the need to wear one ,I don't feel invincible whilst wearing it and I certainly don't think I'm any better than any one else for wearing it , I don't care what the statistics say ,the hat might save my life,it might not but wearing it isn't doing me any harm so I might as well,it also makes a good mount for my bullet cam :)