ITALY — A close call during an Alpine slalom race has forced the International Ski Federation to announce it will ban drones from the World Cup series.
Marcel Hirscher, a four-time World Cup champion, was making his second run when the drone crashed just several centimeters behind him.
The 26-year-old was able to finish in second place, just 1.25 seconds behind the leader, but later told the media drones shouldn’t be allowed.
“This is horrible,” the BBC reported him as saying. “This can never happen again. This can be a serious injury.”
The International Ski Federation agreed saying the are simply “a bad thing for safety.”
The company who owned the drone later released a statement saying they were investigating what happened that lead to the close encounter.
Hirscher later posted a picture to Instagram joking about the incident.
“Heavy air traffic in Italy :) #crazy #drone#crash #luckyme” he wrote.