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I mean the sort that tries to make sure that everything possible is done to ensure the safety of the participants. E.g. halos (and many other things) in F1 cars
by hobofan 6y ago
I mean the sort that tries to make sure that everything possible is done to ensure the safety of the participants. E.g. halos (and many other things) in F1 cars, helmets in baseball, minimizing crosswinds in ski flying, etc..
For Elfstedentocht this could mean making sure the ice is 15cms thick along the entire track, and only starting it if you are 100% sure that this is guaranteed. I would question whether the organization in the past was that strict, or the ice thickness could be as accurately and quickly measured along the entire track as today.
Regulations and what risks are deemed acceptable for sporting events change all the time and have led to huge alterations and the end of certain recurring events in a lot of sports. So (partially) independent from climate change, safety concerns might just cause the end of Elfstedentocht.
- Freak_NL 6y agoNo, this is not an issue for this particular event. The last time we came close was 2012, but even then the ice was only 10 or 12cm thick on large parts of the route. This is most emphatically the result of a changing climate. On eleven of the fifteen occurrences of this event the ice measured 25cm of thickness.
- hobofan 6y agoDo you have any source for the historic values of ice thickness? Not questioning it, but I've tried to look around for such a statistic before writing the first comment, but I wasn't able to find anything.
- throwaway2245 6y ago> this could mean making sure the ice is 15cms thick along the entire track, and only starting it if you are 100% sure that this is guaranteed. I'm unable to find any official decision-making rules, let alone historical ones, but as stated elsewhere it's doubtful that the regulations have got more strict. The event has happened only 6 times in the last 70 years, in any case. Where it is useful, there is work to control water flow via locks, ice transplantation into weak points, and legal prevention of canal navigation. So, there is also more knowledge and ability to mitigate for safety concerns.