Special Risks Bureau has just conducted a survey of over 4,000 people in the UK in order to find out which extreme pastime they consider to be the most dangerous.
Respondents were given the choice of rock climbing, skydiving, snowboarding, horse riding, cycling, and scuba diving, and were then asked to choose which of these they thought was the most dangerous.
Taking the top spot is rock climbing with 34% (1492 votes). Alongside rock climbing in the top three dangerous pastimes is skydiving with 27% (1199 votes), and snowboarding with 14% (603 votes).
In order to see how peoples perceptions of the risks posed by these pastimes match up to reality, Special Risks Bureau have conducted research into the accidents that occur when practising these activities.
According to 2014 cycling related accidents statistics, Cycling is in fact the most dangerous pastime with a staggering 19438 accidents and injuries, and 109 deaths recorded per year.
Respondents were not wrong in choosing rock climbing as the most dangerous pastime as it makes up the part of the top three most dangerous sports with 1022 accidents and injuries, and 21 deaths per year according to BMC.
In 2013 the total incident number, involving of rock climbing and hill walking, of 1022. Of these there were 21 deaths. There were 53 fatal accidents in 2010 when, notably, 3 died from lightning strikes.
Taking third place is scuba diving. The BSAC have reported 263 diving incidents and 14 deaths.
