Jonatan Johansson (snowboarder)

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Jonatan Johansson (7 March 1980 - 12 March 2006) was a Swedish Olympic snowboarder.

Born in Sollentuna, Stockholms län, he had a bad landing on one of his jumps during training for the International Ski Federation World Cup competition.

He was twelfth in the final rankings for Snowboard Cross at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy.

He had been competing at the World Cup level since 2000 and was ranked 45th in the world. In 2005, he was Swedish champion and won first prize in the Finnish National Championship.

He died in a snowboarding accident at Whiteface Mountain in Lake Placid, New York, five days after his 26th birthday.^[1]

He was killed in an accident during practice, barely a month after the 2006 olympics.

The track wasn't special in any way. The speed was not extremely high and the jumps were not big, says the Swedish Snowboard association's Anders Wiggerud. - It was Jonatan Johansson's last run of the day. The snow had just become faster and the previous riders jump very far, due to the speed. These were not any problems for Jonatan, according to Anders Wiggerud, he was a good snowboarder and must have felt to difference as well, so he can not have been surprised by the speed.

Attempting the jump that was going to be his last, Jonatan probably breaks a little and loses his balance. Nobody saw him in the exact moment before the jump, which makes the events quite unclear. Unbalanced, instead of lying down, Jonatan attempts to jump anyway, says Anders Wiggerud.

In the jump, Jonatan loses his balance and falls. His thigh-bone snaps and is pushed up and breaks his ribs. The aorta is ripped and a lung and his heart is punctured. He dies immediately. - I don't understand how the injuries could be so serious, says his coach Lars Bergstedt, I've seen crashes that are much worse than that. It was a matter of extremely bad luck.