Sarah Burke was a Canadian freestyle skier who grew up in Midland, Ontario, Canada. She later resided in Whistler, British Columbia. Burke won first place in the 2001 US Freeskiing Open in the half-pipe and second place in slopestyle. She won the first ever world championship half-pipe event. Burke is also a four-time Winter X Games gold medalist in freestyle skiing. She was the first woman ever to land a jump with 1080-degree rotation in competition. She won ESPN's 2001 Award for female skier of the year and was voted 2007's Best Female Action Sports Athlete at the ESPY awards as well as BERT, the first skier to be so honored. She regularly participated in skiing films, including Propaganda, in which she showcased her skills by sliding huge rainbow rails, spinning a huge 540 in the pipe and throwing back-flips with ease. Burke was a longtime activist for equal opportunity for women to compete in freestyle skiing. She campaigned for inclusion of her sport in the Olympics, which was approved for the 2014 games in Sochi, Russia. She was voted number 91 on the FHM-U.S.'s 100 Sexiest Women 2006 list. Burke also enjoyed knitting, cooking and baking, mountain biking, going to the gym, painting, and climbing. On September 25, 2010 Burke married fellow freeskier Rory Bushfield in Pemberton, B.C. On January 10, 2012 Burke was seriously injured while training on the Park City Mountain Resort Eagle superpipe in Park City, Utah. This is the same superpipe where snowboarder Kevin Pearce was seriously injured in 2009. Onlookers reported that Burke had completed a trick fairly well yet fell onto her head, and the accident did not appear to be very severe. Moments later, however, she went into cardiac arrest while still on the ski slope, making her chance of survival extremely low. She was resuscitated and airlifted to the University of Utah Hospital in Salt Lake City, where she was reported to be in a coma. The following day, she underwent neurosurgery to repair a tear in a vertebral artery, however, she died from her injuries on January 19, 2012.

Sarah Burke was a Canadian freestyle skier who grew up in Midland, Ontario, Canada. She … more >