Natasha Richardson

Ah, so she did die....so sad. I was following the news yesterday. From the sounds of it she had quite an easy "fall" so I, too, think there was a preexisting condition. So, so sad..... 

This whole thing scared the crap out of me because I'm pretty adventurous and am always falling, whether it's off a bike or on the ice. But I've finally resolved to try to adhere to what, for me, is the lesson I need to learn from hearing this sort of news: Embrace each day and try to find the joy in it and love your people as much and as hard and as often as you can...because you just never know when your time on this planet will end....ya know?

~Marin

You don't have to have a preexisting condition to die from a fall like that.  Unfortunately, all you have to do is hit your head the right way/ at the right speed.  Also, I'm all for helmets, but wearing one might not have helped her in this situation because they usually only protect up to a speed of 15mph and even on a beginners trail one probably reaches speeds of 25mph.  So sad.  My heart goes out to her and her family.

Soprano

Like Joan said on LKL "When we wake up each morning we should be so thankful" 

This accident and death of Natasha Richardson makes me sick and sad. 

I had a horrible head injury a few years ago skiing and came home with my head wrapped up like a mummy with only one eye visible.  Yesterday's news brought it all back and gave me the goose bumps.  What a freak accident to actually die from.  I hope the autopsy reveals what happened.

I love her mom Vanessa Redgrave and her Guenevere in Camelot.  My favorite scene is when she is in the flower filled meadow with the knights and ladies in waiting and she sings "The Merry Month of May"    She was like a butterfly of gentleness in that movie.   She must be beyond devastated about her equally lovely daughter. 

I have been so shaken by this.

What a lovely woman, and lovely family.  Yesterday, I was reading some quotes from Natasha Richardson, saying how beautiful her mother was in "Camelot," when Natasha saw it as a little girl. ["She was so beautiful. I still look at that movie and I can't believe it. It still makes me cry, the beauty of it. I could go on and on - in that white fur hooded thing, when she comes through the forest for the first time. You've never seen anything so beautiful!" Richardson said.]

In the same interview (from 2003), it went on to say: She once said that Neeson's serious injury in a 2000 motorcycle accident - he suffered a crushed pelvis after colliding with a deer in upstate New York - had made her really appreciate life.  "I wake up every morning feeling lucky - which is driven by fear, no doubt, since I know it could all go away," she told The Daily Telegraph newspaper in 2003.

Sierra, Lynn Redgrave is Natasha's aunt, Vanessa's sister.

I keep wondering -- if the EMT crew had examined her immediately after the fall, when she insisted she was fine and didn't need them -- would they have seen anything wrong?  I know an early sign of bleeding from a head injury like that is that the pupils may appear two different sizes -- if that ever happens to any of you or yours after a blow to the head, that the pupils don't look the same size, or stay big and black even in bright light, or if there's a feeling of nausea, get to the ER right away!

She was not in Toronto.

It seems so odd to me that someone could die from falling down in snow and die.

There was a dr on the TODAY show that explained how certain angles are more dangerous than others. Directly forward or directly back are less dangerous than on the side. With the front and back hits, your brain just bounces forward or back a bit. Depending on the force, you have a better chance of doing less damage. Side blows whips the brain around...twists the brain stem which can cause damage to all the really basic body functions such as breathing.

Very sad and very scary...we used to ski a lot.   My last time skiing I had a horrid fall--hit a patch of ice and lost control, fell and hit my head (no helmuts in those days), it knocked me out.  I thought I was okay by the time the ski patrol arrived, but after talking to me, they bundled me up in what I described as a body bag and put me on a little sled and skiied me down the mountain to their infirmary.   They had reason to be concerned--I insisted that the date was Feb 14th (it was actually in January!) and I did not know who the Pres of the US was--I insisted that it was someone several terms prior to my accident.   I had a mild concussion.   I did get checked out by my PCP when I finally got back home; had a lot of bruises but everything was okay.   No falling off a horse and getting back on for me--I never skiied again!!!