There’s a reason that they bring in stuntmen and stuntwomen for action films.

The stunts are usually incredibly dangerous and require a trained professional, who – let’s be frank – won’t generate a lot of bad press if they are seriously injured.

Vin Diesel, in particular, has had a pretty tragic history with stunt doubles.

Most recently, on the set of Fast & Furious 9, stunt double Joe Watts was seriously injured when a safety cable snapped as he leapt from a balcony for a fight sequence.

The Telegraph reports that the stuntman fell at least 30 feet – maybe a bit more.

Latest reports say that the stuntman – named by the tabloid as Joe Watts, who also worked on Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Spider-Man: Far From Home, and Game of Thrones – is now in an induced coma.

For Vin Diesel, it’s not the first time that a film production has been rocked by a tragic accident. In 2002, his stuntman Harry O’Connor was killed on the set of xXx.

And, though unrelated to filming, the Fast & Furious series’s original lead star Paul Walker was killed in a high-speed car crash during the production of Fast & Furious 7 – a horribly ironic accident that has left a spectre of tragedy hanging over the series since.

Despite the high level of stunts and longevity of the franchise, Fast & Furious has had surprisingly few accidents.

For the opening sequence of the franchise’s fourth installment, Michelle Rodriguez and her stuntman were strapped to the back of a speeding gas tanker; in the opening gambit of Fast Five, Vin Diesel and Paul Walker’s stuntmen leaped from a car as it zoomed off a cliff and plunged into the water below, and in Fast & Furious 7, Walker’s stuntman ran across the top of a bus as it dangled halfway off a cliff before plummeting.

Let’s look into four more times that stunts went horribly wrong, starting with a more in-depth look at what happened to Harry O’Conner.

Harry O’ Conner – xXx

In 2002, Harry Conner, a retired Navy Seal known for his stunts in Air Force One, The Perfect Storm and Charlie’s Angels, doubled for Vin Diesel on xXx.

For this particular scene in xXx, Diesel’s character Xander Cage – an adrenaline junkie-turned-government spy – would paraglide down the Vltava River in Prague, zip-line down from the parachute, swing under the Palacký Bridge, and land on a boat.

But during filming on April 4 2002, O’Connor hit the bridge at full speed and broke his neck.

He died instantly from his injuries. He was 44 years old.

John Bernecker – The Walking Dead

John Bernecker fell 22 feet head-first from a balcony on the set and reportedly missed the padding below, dying the next day from head injuries sustained.

He had 93 credits as a stuntman on major films and TV shows and had even served as a stunt coordinator on a number of projects.

Joi Harris – Deadpool 2

In 2017, Joi Harris was killed in a motorcycle accident on Deadpool 2. It was her first stunt as a stuntwoman, which went horribly wrong when she was thrown from the bike.

She had previously earned repute as the first African-American woman to be licensed in professional motorcycle track racing.

Olivia Jackson – Resident Evil: Final Chapter

Jackson suffered serious injuries and was put in a medically induced coma after crashing her motorbike into a crane on the Johannesburg set.

She later lost her arm and is consequently suing the production company. The case is ongoing.

[source:telegraph]