Freeskiing superstar Sarah Burke, a favorite to win the gold medal at the 2014 Winter Olympics, was seriously injured and is in coma

Freeskiing superstar Sarah Burke, a favorite to win the gold medal at the 2014 Winter Olympics, was seriously injured Tuesday afternoon during a crash in the halfpipe at Park City Mountain Resort in Utah.

The four-time X Games champion struck her head and was airlifted to a hospital in Salt Lake City, according to Newschoolers.com. Later reports confirmed Burke was in a coma, though the extent of her injuries was unknown.

"We're a bit shell-shocked right now," Peter Judge, CEO of the Canadian Freestyle Ski Assn., told the Toronto Star. "It's tough to read. The signs are dramatic and catastrophic, but it's hard to gauge how dramatic and catastrophic. The same treatment and symptoms can be on a broad scale."

Burke was resuscitated on the mountain before being airlifted to University Hospital in Salt Lake.

The Park City halfpipe is the same venue at which snowboarder Kevin Pearce was critically injured while training for the 2010 Olympics on Dec. 31, 2009. Pearce suffered traumatic brain injuries but has since recovered. Last month he rode a snowboard for the first time since the accident.

Burke's husband, Rory Bushfield, told the Vancouver Sun: "Sarah is a very, very strong human and she will be fine."

Burke, who is from Squamish, British Columbia, played a key role in bringing women's freeskiing to the X Games, and to the Olympics. Men's and women's halfpipe and slopestyle competition will debut at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia.

In 2007 Burke was voted Best Female Action Sports Athlete at the annual ESPY Awards.


--Top image is by Doug Pensinger / Getty Images. Action photo of Sarah Burke is courtesy of the Canadian Freestyle Ski Association