http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20041023.wbevskat23/BNStory/Sports/Pittsburgh — World champion pair skater Tatiana Totmianina was carried off the ice on a stretcher Saturday night at the Skate America International competition after a serious fall from a lift.The Russian star appeared to be knocked unconscious in front of a startled crowd before paramedics rushed onto the ice to help her.
Totmianina lay motionless on her right side as partner Maxim Marinin rushed to her side and coach Oleg Vasiliev ran onto the ice from across the ice surface.
The competition's attending physician Dr.Shelana Gibbs of Mercy Hospital said paramedics "stabilized" Totmianina before sending her to Mercy Hospital's level one trauma unit.
Mercy Hospital is nearby the Mellon Arena where the accident took place.
The Russian team had been the final skaters to take to the ice in the final event of the competition.The crowd went silent and Russian coaches and skaters were shaken and in tears. Judges left the stand, also shaken.
Totmianina and Marinin were performing a lift at the 2:19 point of their 4 ½ minute long program when the accident occurred. It was their first competition of the season and they had been leading the event after winning the short program earlier in the week.
The competition ended abruptly after the accident and Zhang Dan and Zhang Hao of China were declared the winners.Another Russian team, Julia Obertas and Sergei Slavnov won the silver medal while Americans Rena Inoue and John Baldwin Jr. won bronze
Obertas watched the incident in horror, remembering her own accident at the 2000 world championships in Nice, France, when partner Dmitri Palamarchuk fell on a lift and she was catapulted to the ice.Last night Obertas said that during her fall, she turned and struck her hip, rather than her head, while Palamarchuk was knocked unconscious and suffered a concussion after his head hit the ice.
Last night, Obertas and Slavnov came close to disaster as well, when her hands slipped on a difficult lift. "I saw the ice coming near me, and thought, oh my god, I have to hold onto something or I will hit my head,'' she said.However, Slavnov saved from harm by grabbing her and setting her down onto the ice. "I was lucky this time,'' Obertas said. "Unfortunately, Tatiana was not so lucky.'
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