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Comment by cr1895 | Hacker News Reader

What sort of heightened security measures? I think nothing of the sort would hamper an Elfstedentocht.

The Vierdaagse is also a mass volunteer-driven event and it happens regularly.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Four_Days_Marc...

I mean the sort that tries to make sure that everything possible is done to ensure the safety of the participants. E.g. halos (and many other things) in F1 cars, helmets in baseball, minimizing crosswinds in ski flying, etc..

For Elfstedentocht this could mean making sure the ice is 15cms thick along the entire track, and only starting it if you are 100% sure that this is guaranteed. I would question whether the organization in the past was that strict, or the ice thickness could be as accurately and quickly measured along the entire track as today.

Regulations and what risks are deemed acceptable for sporting events change all the time and have led to huge alterations and the end of certain recurring events in a lot of sports. So (partially) independent from climate change, safety concerns might just cause the end of Elfstedentocht.

No, this is not an issue for this particular event. The last time we came close was 2012, but even then the ice was only 10 or 12cm thick on large parts of the route. This is most emphatically the result of a changing climate. On eleven of the fifteen occurrences of this event the ice measured 25cm of thickness.

Do you have any source for the historic values of ice thickness? Not questioning it, but I've tried to look around for such a statistic before writing the first comment, but I wasn't able to find anything.

No primary source (although these exist obviously), but the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute has a summary:

https://www.knmi.nl/kennis-en-datacentrum/uitleg/ijsdikte-en...

Thanks!

> this could mean making sure the ice is 15cms thick along the entire track, and only starting it if you are 100% sure that this is guaranteed.

I'm unable to find any official decision-making rules, let alone historical ones, but as stated elsewhere it's doubtful that the regulations have got more strict. The event has happened only 6 times in the last 70 years, in any case.

Where it is useful, there is work to control water flow via locks, ice transplantation into weak points, and legal prevention of canal navigation. So, there is also more knowledge and ability to mitigate for safety concerns.

I think they meant safety as in 'assurance no one will fall through the ice'. As in, by the standards of the 40s they might have let the 2012 race go on despite the ice quality.

Yes, exactly!

In 1940 the ice had a record 41cm of thickness, in 1941 and 1942 the winters were harsh and the thickness of the ice was not a concern either. Only in 1917 was the ice on the thin side at 15cm, which is the minimal thickness for the event to be considered still today.

The standards haven't changed much. The climate has.

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