After a horror accident

“The leg was only hanging by a few muscle strands”

Sandro Michel (right) was lucky to survive the accident in February.(Bild: GEPA)

After his horror accident in February, Swiss bobsleigh pilot Sandro Michel spoke about his experiences and the tough ordeal. The memories still weigh heavily on him. Michel is certain that he was very lucky to have escaped with his life: "My leg was only hanging on by a bit of skin and a few muscle strands," the Swiss athlete describes in an emotional post on Instagram.  

"For many of you, it's probably no longer too present, but for me it's still omnipresent. I'm reminded of it every day through therapy, the restrictions in everyday life and the huge scars that now mark my body," Michel writes on Instagram. The statement is complemented by a photo of the bobsleigh rider in the gym, leaning on a stick. 

Pusher Michel suffered serious injuries to his chest and pelvis when his world-class pilot Michael Vogt crashed in February. The 210 kg sled with three crew members weighing a good hundred kilograms had slid uncontrollably from the uphill finish curve back into the track and hit the lying Michel, who had been thrown out, with full force.

"The situation affected me more than I want to admit," admits the Swiss rider. He is now working on getting physically fit again. His next goal is to be able to move around normally again without a walking stick. 

Accusations against the train operator
The fact that the 28-year-old has reached this point at all is nothing short of a miracle. "In addition to various broken ribs, a broken shoulder blade, severed muscles in my chest, considerable blood loss and a lung that has filled with blood, I was particularly badly hit in the hip area. The report states that the wound was 35 by 50 centimeters in size. The hip bone was dislocated," Michel describes it himself.

However, he particularly remembers the condition of his leg. "It was just hanging on by a bit of skin and a few muscle strands. It's only thanks to the excellent reaction of the rescue workers on site and the incredible work of the doctors in Dresden that I'm still alive and even have both legs," the bobsleigh pro is certain. 

He also criticized the operators of the track in Altenberg. A similar situation had already occurred shortly before his accident. The pusher had also fallen out of the bobsleigh and was almost run over afterwards. However, the situation turned out to be less serious. "At that point at the latest, you should have seen what could happen. I simply can't understand why the incident in the morning wasn't dealt with and why everything wasn't done to prevent a repeat," said the Swiss athlete, who is still waiting for a reaction from the track operators.