On February 8, Lindsey Vonn suffered a complex tibia fracture to her left leg after she hooked a gate and crashed just 13 seconds into the women’s downhill skiing competition. That was her first event at the Milan Cortina Olympics, which was supposed to be her big comeback after injuries forced her to retire in 2019. Since then, Lindsey has had multiple surgeries to stabilize her injuries, both in Italy and after being transferred to a hospital in Colorado early last week.
Over the last two-plus weeks, Lindsey’s been giving her fans frequent updates on her Instagram page. On Monday, she announced that she’s finally out of the hospital and revealed that she also broke her right ankle in the crash. Lindsey shared more details about her broken leg. As it turns out, she had two additional fractures. Her injuries were so bad that she developed something called compartment syndrome that almost caused her leg to be amputated. Lindsey’s description of compartment syndrome and how her orthopedic surgeon saved life is in the quoted text below, but just a warning: it’s not for the squeamish.
Lindsey Vonn revealed she could have lost her leg as the result of her crash in the downhill at the Milano Cortina Olympics.
In an Instagram post Monday, Feb. 23, Vonn detailed injuries that were far more extensive than initially known. In addition to the complex tibial fracture in her left leg, Vonn said she had a tibial plateau fracture and fractured fibular head. She also broke her right ankle.
Vonn also had compartment syndrome, and said that was what posed the greatest threat.
“Compartment syndrome is when you have so much trauma to one area of your body, that there’s too much blood, and it gets stuck, and it basically crushes everything in the compartment,” Vonn said “All the muscle and nerves and tendons, it all kind of dies. And Dr. Tom Hackett saved my leg. He saved my leg from being amputated.”
Excessive pressure building up inside a muscle, either from bleeding or swelling, causes compartment syndrome. The pressure restricts blood flow and can lead to permanent injury if not treated quickly.
Vonn said Hackett, her longtime orthopedic surgeon, was in Cortina to watch her compete at her fifth Olympics. He conducted a fasciotomy to save her leg when she was hospitalized in Italy.
“He filleted it open (and) let it breathe, and he saved me,” she said.
Vonn also announced that she’s out of the hospital.
She was hospitalized in Italy for a little over a week before being transferred to a hospital in Colorado. She has had five surgeries since the Feb. 8 crash, including one last week after she returned to the United States that lasted more than six hours.
“Now I will focus on rehab and progressing from a wheelchair to crutches in a few weeks,” Vonn said in the post. “It will take around a year for all of the bones to heal and then I will decide if I want to take out all the metal or not, and then go back into surgery and finally fix my ACL.”
Vonn said all of the surgeries have caused an enormous amount of pain, and also required her to have a blood transfusion. She said Team USA’s performance at the 2026 Winter Olympics has helped bring her joy during this difficult time.
“It’s been really hard … it was definitely not the way I wanted to end my Olympics,” Vonn said. “But it’s been really inspiring to watch my teammates. Everyone’s just been incredible, and watching Team USA dominate has been really uplifting.
“I always fight, I’ll keep going. No regrets. And, I just appreciate all the love and support. It’s been really amazing.”
That is so scary! Dr. Hackett is not only Lindsey’s personal orthopedic surgeon in Vail, CO, but he’s also served as a physician for Team USA for every Winter Olympics since 2010. Thank goodness he was there and able to perform the surgery. It must have been a small relief for Lindsey to have someone she knew and trusted operating on her. She’s going to have a long recovery ahead of her, and I truly wish her all of the best.
Meanwhile, Lindsey has had a lot of fans rallying around her, including some very famous ones. Some of the many celebrities that have commented on her Instagram posts include Reese Witherspoon, Taylor Lautner, Ashley Judd, and Mariska Hargitay, who even visited her in the hospital. Lindsey’s sister also helped her keep her spirit up by pointing out one “silver lining” of her hospital stay was all of the hot Italian nurses and doctors. She even made a video creeping on some of them. I watched the video and can confirm that there were indeed hot Italians working at that hospital.
Photos credit: Credit: Imago/Frank Heinen/Avalon, Francesca Vieceli/IPA/INSTARimages, Backgrid,IMAGO/Revierfoto/Avalon
Omg. I have so much sympathy. It’s going to be a long recovery but she’s strong and has a good team. I’ve been grumpy and slacking on physical therapy so yeah this is reminding me to suck it up and just get it done every day.
Lots of sympathy for her but I also think she’s as kick-azz as she is crazyy! Get well soon.
Wishing Lindsey all the best in her recovery!
I broke my leg in September 2024. You can see 2 tibia breaks and 1 fibula break on the x-ray from the ER. When my ortho dr did the surgery 10 days after I broke my leg, he said there were “multiple other breaks” and it has been quite the journey. Not nearly as bad as Lindsey’s break but I can definitely sympathize. I’m still so careful when I walk and am still dealing with random pain and stuff from the incident.
Take care! Seeing images of your fractured leg is kinda scary & kinda wild. Almost exactly a year ago I managed to get a Maisonneuve fracture of my fibula combined with a sprained foot (my ankle was spared); luckily, I didn’t need surgery. That rotating 3D image of Lindsay’s broken bones was wild! My break also had little broken pieces, but nothing like Lindsay’s!
She’s heroic. I give her all the love in the world. Really, she’s on the same side as life.
First hospital picture she posted on instagram you can literally see her leg is split open.
She’s so lucky she had great doctors- they mentioned amputation, but also sectioning of the bone, which would have meant one leg significantly shorter than the other.
It’s going to be a looong recovery, but when you see what happened to Federica Brignone everything is possible.
Olympic downhill skiers reach speeds of 80 to 95 mph, thrilling to watch but the other side of the coin is the danger. Hope Lindsey is past the worst stuff and the recovery goes smoother now!
I suffered a spontaneous femur fracture in 2011 and had to be transported to a hospital about three hours away because there wasn’t an orthopedic surgeon in our area who was able to do the surgery to repair it. They had to insert a rod literally thru my femur to reconnect the broken section, and secure it with screws and wires at both the top and bottom of the bone itself. I have three scars; one near my knee, one midway on my thigh, and one on my hip. The rod is one long piece and I still have no idea how they inserted it into the bone, and frankly I don’t want to know! After 5 days in hospital, several blood transfusions, and a car ride 3 hours to get back home, I woke up a night or two later to the most intense pain I’ve ever experienced, far worse than the actual break itself. I was recuperating at my mom’s house, and she woke to the sound of my screams. She thought I was dying and so did i. After being transported via ambulance to a nearby hospital, they stabilized me and sent me home the next day. Same thing happened the next night, only this time they brought in an orthopedic specialist who diagnosed me with compartment syndrome. He was debating surgery but warned me of the likelihood of intense recovery and potential permanent damage, but decided to hold off to see if there were other options. Thankfully, he was able to perform some therapeutic measures while I was under heavy sedation, and he relieved the pressure around the muscles. Six weeks of in-home therapy, walker and crutches and large quantities of pain meds, I was back on my feet and on the road to long-term recovery. My leg still gives me trouble, especially when it’s cold, and I always activate scanners at the airport, but most of the time I’m fine. Sending all the best thoughts to Lindsey as she recovers from her horrible injury; she’s a total badass and I have no doubt she will be back out there doing what she loves in no time!
Oh my goodness EmmGee!! I’m so glad that you were able to recover, what a traumatic experience you went through!
I feel this! Although I was lucky to not have compartment syndrome, I did (well, it’s still there) end up getting an ulcer on my heel. I left the ER around 2am with the splint on and by 6am I was crying in pain. It felt like my heel had been sliced open, gas poured in and set on fire. We went back to the ER and 13 hours later they had loosened my splint and given me 1 percocet. That’s all, they never even tried to look at my heel and after my ortho surgery the nurse said “why is there a bandage on your ankle oh my god” it was a nasty black hole. We think I cut my heel during the fall and maybe some gravel or something got into the cut and it wasn’t clean or treated at all.
I have a giant titanium rod through my tibia!! And have no idea how they got it in there, the scar on my knee is only about 2 inches long and then there are some smaller scars where they put the screws in. I also have more pain when it is really cold and sometimes when we’re going to have a big thunderstorm.
Yikes! You never want to hear ‘oh my god’ from your medical professional! That’s right up there with ‘never saw that before’!
The leg fracture was definitely complex, but from what I’ve seen of orthopedic surgeons commenting on her break and x-rays, she is exaggerating about her leg, potentially needing to be amputated. Compartment syndrome is common with this kind of fracture and it doesn’t lead to amputation, except if wholly untreated. Apparently it’s quite normal and the treatment for it is to open the leg with this type of injury. So it sounds like Lindsay is exaggerating how close she could have been to possibly losing the limb.
????? She exaggerated nothing!
Compartment syndrome is real and a medical emergency. It can lead to significant morbidity, even beyond amputation of the limb, if untreated. Doctors can miss all sorts of things. Just because they didn’t, in her case, doesn’t mean it wasn’t serious.
Actually it was an orthopedic surgeon who initially mentioned the risk of amputation.
She posted a picture after one of her surgeries, and he commented on the very clear risks.
He was measured, but clearly saw it as a worst option/not out of the woods scenario.
Omg!! I broke my wrist in 3 places in November (my first broken bones) and it’s been tough but hearing about Lindsey’s injury and resilience is very inspiring to push through the pain and discomfort.
Oops, I was attempting to reply to you, Harla. Please see below. 🙃
A few years ago I managed to break my foot, stepping off a curb to cross the street, in broad daylight, while totally sober! It was very annoying, and also very painful. I hope they’re giving Lindsay the good drugs.
I was surprised at how long it took to heal. And now I can predict incoming rain storms!
I’m finding that I too have the ability to predict cold and damp weather, what I’ve always wanted.
I don’t know if this is an ignorant take, but when I heard that she’d ruptured her ACL and had to be airlifted off the mountain 2 weeks before the Olympics, my first thought was maybe she should’ve sat this one out and given someone else the spot. But, at the same time, she earned her place on the team. Either way, I’m glad she’s okay, that looked like a painful crash.
It’s not an ignorant take at all. I don’t know how you stand, let alone ski, on a torn ACL. Wish her well but that was insanity.
The ACL had nothing to do with her accident. She unfortunately caught her arm in the gate & that was that.
Just my personal opinion but I believe her torn ACL, damaged meniscus, and heavily wrapped and padded left knee, played a part in her accident. Think about the pressure being put on that left leg to keep her stable, control her turns, digging into the ice and snow, taking the jarring bumps as she flew down that hill. If the strength and control were not 100% there, if she over compensated for the bundled up knee, that could have easily caused a miscalculation that took her into that gate. I find the constant posts about not regretting a thing, and the insistence that the left knee did not have anything to do with the crash to frankly be ridiculous. I’m a big fan of Lindsey Vonn but I don’t find her behavior heroic in any way. She needlessly risked her life and those who had to rescue her, for what?
Oh gosh, what a road to recovery she has. It really is devastating to watch her Olympic career end this way. I wish her all the best and I hope eventually she can ski for pleasure once this is all behind her. Maybe that’s being too hopeful though.
I felt so bad for Lindsay! She worked so hard to come back from her previous injuries and to do it at her age (gad, I hate saying things like that, but there are reasons Olympic athletes tend to be on the younger side), I was just so rooting for her! I watched one of those short videos they do of the athletes for the Olympics, this one included all her doctors & physical therapists & all the work she did to come back. Such a shame. I love her determination to recover from this latest devastation.
Getting winched up to a helicopter while in a stretcher would have scared me nearly to death.