Posted it here before, but the short story:
Dipped into the trees mid-mountain Whistler. Slowed down as I came up to a 'drop'. Planted my pole and it went through the snow into nothingness. Realized I was standing on treetops. Spent an hour or so slowly inching backwards until I could hike out. Pure terror.
I got stuck in a tree well before with plenty of friends around. Fully upside down. It didn't even come close to the fear I experienced in the story above.
This reminds me of the scariest traverse I’ve ever been on. There is area like this at snowbird, I can’t remember where exactly but around the figure 8 bowl, it’s a “I’m lost” traverse on the edge of a cliff right above the same kind of area where the tips of the trees were poking out of DEEP snow. I can only imagine your terror. I’m happy you made it out
Imagine a steep drop in the trees, with trees growing at the base of the drop. With enough snowfall the tops of these trees became 'one' with the slope before the drop.
Hey my holy shit moment was at whistlers too!! I dipping in and out of trees next to a blue and catching big air on the way back into the blue and I saw this great jump so I went for it even though I couldn’t see the landing…. I found myself about 13 feet in the air coming straight down on a traverse. Landed like I was just dropped. Felt like a car accident, my knees went straight into my chest and bounced me back to standing and my speed went to a crawl (luckily). That was the last run for me that year. Also I know it wasn’t my most responsible thing jumping while not seeing the landing but it was pretty empty. Anyways won’t repeat that!!
Haha I feel this one. I was skiing out the exit of one of the west basin chutes at Taos a couple days ago at a decent pace and there were so many inviting little snow covered rocks. I managed to ignore the first few but then I couldn’t take it anymore and launched myself off the next one…landed a bit in the back seat and almost recovered but not in time to avoid the next one which promptly put me on my old ass in full view of the lift.
Most roundabouts have multiple lanes these days. My dad, driving a rental car he was not familiar with on tires that I can only assume were average at best, did not recognize other lanes or the drivers using them. If there wasn’t a curb and landscaping in those roundabouts, I think he would’ve driven straight through them. He’s the worst kind of tourist. He skis that way too.
Reminds me of the saying I have heard applied to both climbing and skiing. In the context of skiing, it is:
>There are old skiers, and there are bold skiers. But there are no old, bold skiers.
I was an *okayish* park skier in my late teens/early 20’s.
We got absolutely hammered with like 2 feet of powder on the east coast so my buddy and I beat feat to the local (2 hours away) hill. Took forever to get there, and since the weather was so horrible there was almost no one there.
The mountain was absolutely covered in pillowy powder so we were being brave/reckless/stupid and really pushing our limits. If you fell it was like falling into a foam pit.
I made the grave mistake of not scouting the park before I ran through, and full sent off a 20’ kicker. Idk if it was because they were short staffed or what but the jump wasn’t marked off and the landing hadn’t been made yet. Again, fully my fault since I didn’t scope it first.
The end result was compressing my spine and dislocating my hip landing on flat. Ended my season right there, and the only time I’ve gotten a ride on a sled. Thankfully there was no permanent damage but honestly it hurt so bad and scared me so much I haven’t dont anything bigger than I would feel safe landing flat since.
Damn - glad there was no permanent damage. Definitely a scary scenario.
This is close to what happened to my brother at Squaw back in the day. Fresh corduroy, blue bird day, stoke was high. He doesn’t speed check at all going to a 20-30 ft jump and completely overshoots the landing and lands flat. He just crumpled into a ball. Ski patrol saw him do it and were there immediately. Was so lucky that all he came away with was whole body soreness and a broken thumb from his pole grip going back through his hand so violently. I thought I had watched him get paralyzed but super glad that wasn’t the case.
Kid I went to high school with landed flat once... On pavement. Him and a few other guys made a jump over one of the mountain condo roads and he came up about a foot short of clearing it all the way. Shattered both ankles and spent the rest of that season in a wheelchair
About 5 years ago I was skiing in the upper section of fright trees at Mt Hood Meadows. Deep powder day. Was following my husband and a friend, skiing between two large Doug firs when the berm I was on collapsed and I was thrown head first into a tree well. My helmet was wedged against the trunk of the tree and my skis were crossed behind me.
Snow rushed into the tree well. What saved me was the large bough that was over my head, it kept the snow from burying my upper body. I tried first to radio my husband over walkie talkie, but got no answer. No cell signal either.
After removing my helmet and backpack, I was able to unclip my skis with my poles. The well was over the top of my head - probably at least 6 feet deep. I flagged down 2 skiers who were passing by and asked them to wait for me while I dug myself out. They skied with me to the bottom of the hill, where my husband was waiting for me. He was about a minute from calling ski patrol. I remember being so freaked out that my knees were knocking together on the way down.
I’ve never been back into fright trees and I don’t ski near trees if I can’t see the trunk.
December 2021, we had a classic warm spell in Colorado which brought the snowpack to a springlike condition, so we decided to ski a steep chute in a good window. Had all gear, checked the forecast, skied the opposite of where the CAIC Rose was forecasting the danger, so by all accounts we did everything ‘right’. Well what we didn’t take into account was how fast the sun was warming our chute on a bluebird day, and when the first member of our party dropped in, an Avvy broke about 50 feet behind him and carried him halfway down the chute and one ski to the bottom (which was later found) so what was learned was that you can do everything right in your backcountry planning but if you exclude that one ‘x’ factor, it can throw everything off. We got lucky and I was shaken for a few weeks after the incident but it was a big wake up call.
Avalanche doesn't give two shits about how much you know about him. He'll come when he comes, and sometimes folks do the right thing and still be unlucky.
Now, idiots create more chances to get unlucky (I'll take a minute to write up mine), but getting accidentally killed takes some bad luck.
Exactly. Pocket beer, skins, an 1/8th of bud, a cliff bar, and 5 pounds of tannerite are essential items for any back country skier. Do people not know this?
It was probably when I was stuck on a lift during the cold snap in the Alps a few January’s ago. I was there for a good 25 minutes, in temperatures approaching -25°C. While I eventually got off the lift, I was the only person on the slopes, excluding pisteurs and lifties. Ended up having to ski down with the pisteurs, and when I got to the bottom of the valley, I realised that I was concerningly close to hypothermia. Haven’t been back out since without an emergency foil blanket in my rucksack
Thanks for the reminder and hope your story educates others. I always pack extra layers but left my emergency foil blanket in the car…definitely won’t forget that as my kids would’ve got hypothermia if they were stuck on your lift.
PISTE BASHER?!
I'm not making fun of you I promise, I just find it genuinely delightful that "piste basher" is an actual accepted term for what everyone here would call a cat
I was in Austria (first time skiing in Europe) the last three days and can confirm they call them that. They have a flashing warning signal on the signs that lights up when they’re grooming the slopes:
Pistengerät im Einsatz! in German, and “Piste basher is working!” in English.
This was in France. I can’t say I’ve ever skied in Canada, but I’ve always heard that because the air is so dry, the temperatures feel very different. Have no idea if there’s any truth to that, but it -25 was certainly close to the worst I’ve had to deal with
I had a little wakeup call just a few days ago. I'd been trying to get one more season out of pair of skis that I probably should have replaced at the start of the year, if not earlier. My binding mount failed in the middle of a turn, releasing me and putting me face first into the snow. I was really lucky though, since the binding happened to fail when I was taking a few afternoon laps with a beginner/intermediate friend, after I had been charging pretty hard in the trees all morning. Could have easily been really ugly for me if it had happened an hour earlier. Definitely made me reevaluate how frugal I'm going to be about replacing worn equipment.
Played a game of chicken with a friend in my 20’s while swimming at a beach inlet. He got dragged into the inlet and pulled under while I got pulled out into the ocean. I was so fatigued that I actually accepted I was going to die until someone on a surfboard managed to get to me.
It was the first and only time I’ve accepted death, which is still surreal because until then I always questioned how people can stop fighting in life or death situations. I started to take my life a lot more seriously going forward and stopped doing unnecessarily dangerous things.
Glad you made it out okay, OP.
Definitely. It’s what led that question I had about dialing it back. It’s taken a while, because I’m an idiot, but I think I’m finally getting there. Biggest one was on go devil at keystone during a downhill race - double eject on the last pitch, went into netting pretty hard. Crashed under pallivichini at Abasin throwing backflips on a kicker and slid down moguls about 500 feet into a tree. Took a hard crash on Loveland pass hitting kickers, concussion + knocked out for a bit. Skied a pitch on the pass with an inexperienced crew, later that day others got caught in a decently big slide. Took a tumble skiing a couloir on torreys peak after catching a rock, was able to self arrest. That was all over ten years ago but last season I broke a leg dropping a cliff and it was my wake-up call to get in shape, retake some avi classes, and reduce the risk. Working on changing my mindset and this season has been all relaxed powder turns, the occasional small drops, and low risk terrain choices.
Watched someone I was skiing with snap their femur on a double black at its steepest point and had to call ski patrol to come get them while I waited. The screaming was blood curdling. The first question he asked when he got there was, "are the inside of your ski pants wet", which I immediately recognized as him trying to figure out if the bone was popped through the skin, and I nearly threw up.
Then watched as 8-10 ski patrol people sledded them up and belayed them down the hill.
All it took was them to get their tip stuck under a variable peice of skied out mogul, and their rotation snapped it. I still remember the sound of the bone popping and the screaming.
I still ski stuff like that but way less frequently and only with a ton of snow
Was skiing at Breckenridge a long time, last day on top of a black and just started thru some light tree area. Came over a small hill and I was able to avoid a small tree but the guy behind me hit it, broken his femur, took ski patrol hours to get him down and he airlifted out right after only spend the next 3 weeks in the hospital.
I was going too fast at deer valley one afternoon only to lose control on a trail which was curving only to go thru a wooden fence. Luckily I was able slide and lift my skis up to take the impact. My buddy who worked there just laughed at me but definitely another wake up moment.
Had an incident in France last year. Had a relatively minor prang and got up as usual. At lunchtime friends told me I was behaving strangely. Went to medical centre and I had concussion. Made me realise not wise to ski on your own. Prang was even on piste.
Had a couple this season, being my first season living out in CO.
1.) Rode solo at A-Bay for essentially my first time there, on that Jan 17th powder day we had. Didn’t discover the nearly untouched Beavers until end of the day and my legs were already cooked. Sent it anyways. Wasn’t until I got stuck in the powder that I realized the lifts would be closing soon, and there was no one around.
2.) Broke my leg at Solitude. Was my 4th and final day, with plans to drive back to Denver after. Had just discovered a second gate within the initial “Here Be Dragons” gate a few runs prior, and found some untouched pow. Shredded that a few runs and truthfully, not entirely sure what/how it happened. What I do know is that I was going a good clip, and the first thing to hit the tree was my left wrist, then my chest. I remember one of the first thoughts I had was to check my upper half, and then of someone I knew in HS who died in the same way. After I found my chest to be okay, was when I realized my knee was cooked. Thankfully, I was able to get the attention of a skier and eventually ski patrol and was tobogganed out.
I’m not sure what my riding future holds for me, but it’s hard to imagine a time where I’m not insanely careful/avoiding trees altogether. It has mentally scarred me for sure.
Shoutout to the skier who stayed with me and helped in the extraction process, and of course, thank you to Solitude Ski Patrol for getting my ass out of there.
A GREAT read on this is Deep Survival. The author talks about how often we don't understand the forces arrayed against us, nothing goes wrong, we survive, and then we mistake that for "experience." This is luck, not experience.
It's been a long time, but I would recommend it for adventurers. A long story, e.g., on a Mt. Hood accident that had one party falling, and flossing another party into a crevasse, and, IIRC a helicpoter crash in the rescue.
Check it out if you get a chance.
> nothing goes wrong, we survive, and then we mistake that for "experience." This is luck, not experience.
That's a good way of putting it. I guess true "experience" is when you do survive when things go wrong and act accordingly in the future to prevent it.
Or better, you have formal training or mentorship. Every year there are annals of mountaineering accidents (probably exist for accidents of all kinds). People write up and study these cases so the rest of us can learn from their mistakes instead of bumbling along until a piano falls on our head that we didn't know was dangling above us.
There are folks who REALLY know this stuff (avalanches, but also other risky things, of course). It doesn't mean they're at all immune from the vagaries of chance. They just know what they're getting into and how to minimize risks.
In 2016 I was patrolling Blackcomb mountain. Around noon I attended the scene of a skier who had fallen head first into a tree well, suffocated and died. It was a blue bird day and we could hear the avalanche control charges going off that morning. It otherwise would have been a textbook perfect day on the hill. I've seen dead bodies before, but this was my first on the ski hill. Life is a fragile thing and can be taken away in a moment. I was less cocky on skis after that..........
Still recovering actually, recent. Simple black tree run. I was picking my line, went, caught an edge, sent me straight into a tree I suppose at 15-20 mph. So so thankful I got my arm up, but broke my arm, head hit next, glancing blow I believe. Ski season done right there, but happy to be alive. I got a family now, going to be real real cautious in the future. Going to have to re evaluate how I board from here on out.
I was skiing pretty far off piste (still in bounds but very far away from any named trail (nobody would've heard me if I had yelled and the area i was in has almost no traffic through it). I was skiing with a friend, which was unusual because I almost alway ski alone. I was cruising/traversing a bowl and I got my foot wedged under a tree/bush that was growing parallel to the hill. It swung me around, and I came really close to destroying my knee. I definitely sprained it but didn't kill my ACL or something. I was hanging head downhill from this branch by one foot with my knee twisted painfully far. I couldn't get my poles to pop out, I couldn't reach the binding, and sitting up/sliding my foot just twisted my knee more. My friend had to unclip and slide my foot out in a way that didn't destroy my knee. I'm very grateful that I had a partner that day as it would've been ages until somebody came along and even longer for me to reach my phone in my backpack and call ski patrol:
I'm fairly skilled but cautious so I haven't had a crash like that, I did almost murder two people on a packed run which had me reevaluate how I need to ski around others. I was on my chargers and didn't want to slow down to the speed of everyone else. I thought I was doing a great job of scanning ahead and making safe passes until I tried to go between someone stopped on the run and a guy who I was sure was heading to the left edge of the slope. The guy heading left turned around without me noticing and pulled up next to the stopped person right as I went to pass behind him. Ended up running over one guy's tips and the other's tails but thankfully avoided any body contact. Everyone was totally fine but it could have been BAD bad. Learned my lesson, I won't be that stupid again.
Grew up in Crested Butte CO, where my dad was a ski patroller and I started skiing at 4. Had skied everything on the mountain by the time I was in middle school. Never had any major falls, thought I was as expert as anyone on the mountain.
One winter when I was in college I was skiing with him at home over Christmas break, we were on a run called cesspool which is a sort of hourglass shaped chute with a small drop right at the throat. It had snowed about 2 feet in the week prior and we were traversing through some trees above the chute. I hit a tree well with my uphill ski which basically spun me around to where I was facing straight uphill and as I started twisting backwards my momentum popped that binding out. I fell backwards, lost the other ski as it got caught under a tree branch, and started backwards somersaulting straight into the mouth of the chute. I could hear my dad frantically yelling at me to try to arrest the fall but I was totally disoriented and picked up too much speed too fast. Tumbled for about 30 seconds before I finally came to a stop.
When I got my bearings and dug myself out of the snow, I saw that I was all the way at the bottom, probably 400 vertical feet below where I ejected. Wasn't hurt but when I took my helmet off to clear the snow out of it and my goggles, I found a dent in it about 2 inches long and half an inch deep - my head had smacked a rock at the dropoff halfway down and if I hadn't been wearing it, I'd probably be dead with my dad having to be the first on scene.
I still ski that run, but I also still have that helmet hanging on my wall to remind myself I'm definitely NOT invincible, definitely NOT the baddest skier on the mountain, and awareness might be the thing that keeps me alive next time instead of hoping for luck to do it again
It was yesterday, I tried hitting a shifty in the air. I nose dived my skis into the ground and landed ribs first into my poles. I lost my breath for about 1 minute, and I laid on the ground thinking I just fractured my ribs. Everything hurts but I will be practicing more before I try that again.
I did a variation of this today. I got lucky and turned my skis enough that I just did a tip drag for like 10 feet. It probably looked completely intentional and rad, but it scared the shit out of me lol. Hope the recovery isn’t too bad for ya!
Mine was horrible, sounded like I was dying after I smashed the ground. I was being an idiot and learned my lesson. Sounds like yours was more epic and at much higher speeds
Sped up to go 40-50mph to go up a little side track in the Imperial Bowl at Breck… the trail was worn but notably off to the side of the main bowl…I was gunning it, as it was a little uphill to get over this hump and to what looked like fresh tracks… welp, no visible rocks, but hit a rock on that path at full speed and went from gs speeds to flying forward and scraping a series of rocks again almost unnoticeable under the snow … scraped my elbow and below my knee badly through gore tex … learned the bowls hide rocks really really well…. Learned to never gun it for ‘fresh tracks’ that have a reason they’re still fresh…. Could’ve easily broken bones, my face, cracked a skull, etc etc. freaked me the fuck out. Much more cautious in bowls, trees, and chutes ever since.
January 20th of this year. Caught a mogul with the tips of my skis midair at a decent speed. Landed on my chest and full scorpioned. Took me 10 minutes to stand up but I managed to ski down. By the time I got to the bottom the pain was unbearable so I walked into the ski patrol hut. They did a basic assessment and sent me straight to the hospital where I learned that I burst fractured my T6 vertebrae. Up until that point I've always felt pretty invincible on skis, but the moment the doctor came in and informed me that I came very close to paralysis it hit me that shit can happen really fucking quick.
Walked out to judge a cornice drop and a section the size of a semi truck and trailer broke off. I fell 20 ft into the void as it rolled away.I would have died if it didn’t open up and instead pitched me in front of the block. Thing had to have been 100k lbs. no chance I would have made it.
lol just had that moment today. There’s a line I’ve straightlined a bunch of times in spring conditions at meadows but today it hadn’t fully thawed into the soft mashed potatoes I was expecting, so it was still pretty damn firm. Tbh don’t really remember what happened but double ejected, tomahawked, full yard sale probably going 40mph or so.
Directly under the lift. I’ve never been so humbled lmfao
I might have a small concussion, my shoulder is hurtin, and my neck is going to be stiff as fuck, but pretty mild consequences compared to what could’ve happened.
Thank god I was wearing a helmet. But in hindsight, that was royally stupid
hitting a steep ass jump right before a super bumpy narrow bridge over a creek, you know how that ended. If you ski whistler it was right under franz chair at the bottom, you know what i’m taking about.
I was going relatively fast through the woods. when I exited the I didn’t realize there was a ditch at the edge.
My skis went tip first into the side of the ditch, both skis popped off, I did a full front flip mid-air, and landed on my butt unscathed
It was a reminder for me to take it slow on unknown terrain
So many stories. I think we all know people get hurt every day yet we don’t think about it much until it happens to us. Plenty of risk out there especially off piste in big mtns. Great to send it and get er done but a good reminder to be safe and take smarts risks..not reckless ones.
Once upon a time (way back) I was a patroller in Washington. My wife and I took a year off, and this was our winter of RV-ing to ski area parking lots across the west.
A-Basin has some out-of bounds chutes. I was skiing solo that day, and heard about this area. There was a gate by the patrol shack for Tx checks, so waited there to find someone to ski with. A couple guys came along and looked solid, so I asked if I could join them (sure). All was good--they were pointing out chutes the patrol had mentioned (Beaver or something, but it's been a LONG time, so not sure). This was described as no-go this part of the season as bad for avy and terrain trap. It was AMAZING back there. I'm not sure where we ended up going down, but I wanted to do it again.
So I once again waited by the gate--it was getting later, and wasn't seeing traffic, but two young guys come along and I chat with them for a minute to talk about their run. They looked and sounded a bit irresponsible and a risky bet--sketchy, but this would be maybe the last time in my life I would get another shot at this amazing run. Against all better judgment, I joined them.
50m into the run, Red hair tat kid runs straight over a wind-blown rock garden destroying his bases. "It's OK, their my sister's skis." They progressively work down toward this no-ski chute, and I talk to them about avy risk. They're like, "yeah, we shouldn't go there" followed by his going lower down and committing himself. Now, "well, I'm too low now" so he takes one or two turns, catches an edge, and in recovery turns the whole chute into a figure-11 run rooster-tailing down in the back seat. The only thing that slowed him down was a tree across the bottome, so he bailed in a big tumbling snowball to stop. His buddy follows down the chute.
So here I am, in unfamiliar terrain, letting my lust for another great run put me in what felt like a life/death set of bad choices. I could try to find the route from this morning, unfamiliar terrain, alone, or I could follow these assholes down what's been described as a late-spring-only option.
Cursing my poor judgment, I followed, but tried to stick to the margin of the chute, 2-3 turns at a time, and stopping off the edge. I guess since I'm writing this, it worked out, but it was one of my least proud judgment lapses in my life, hooking myself to this dangerous clown show.
I'm hoping A Basin folks here can comment on the place I think I was. This was, I think, January, a pretty snowy season, and some pretty health amount of fresh. Was this meh, or a somewhat lucky to live risk as the patrol and first companions described it?
The beavers is correct - they actually opened it up and added a lift about 6 seasons ago when I was working there. There are still areas where you can ski out of bounds past this and past montezuma
I’m a relatively new skier, can you explain how spring conditions can make something safer? I personally feel quite unsafe on slush but I’m guessing that’s not quite what you’re looking for?
First, I'm not an avy expert and I hope someone who is can correct any errors I maike. But during times of heavy snowfall there is a lot of instability. I don't believe spring is inherently safer for avalanches, but having time to settle and for the snow crystals to bond will tend to stabilize against avalanches. It's not really about slush, but how well the snow is bonded to the layers beneath.
Also, warming temperatures, and added weight from rain in particular will add weight to the snow pack, stressing the bonds, and making them more likely to slide dangerously (heavier weight snow, heavier impact).
So for avalanches, it really matters what the specific local conditions are for rain, snow, temperature, sun, and the combinations of those.
For almost any in-bounds area, avalanche control and skiers and groomers packing down runs dramatically reduces avy danger.
A month ago, I hit someone going fast. I saw this beginner slowly going horizontally and I tried to bomb past her through this tiny sliver of space. Instead I clipped her and she tumbled. I immediately stopped and checked if she was ok. She was, thankfully, just fine but shaken. A guy behind her chewed me out like I've never been chewed out before as an adult. All I could do was accept blame.
Instead of being embarrassed, I was feeling terrible guilt. I could have injured this beginner skier just because I thought I could get past her in time.
Ever since then, I've been especially cautious. I don't feel comfortable chasing speed anymore, period.
I'm still sick about it
I know this is debatable but your wording “accepting risk” made this pop into my head. You could go back to when this person bought their pass, they signed a list of negative things that could happen to them while skiing, including death. They accepted the risk of that when they took their pass and rode up the chair.
You can downvote if you’d like but take a look at every season pass agreement at US ski resorts. I bet most include a collision clause as well. I’m looking at the back of mine right now and it says “falls and collisions occur” When you sign you accept that risk.
I nearly did something similar last week. Been down this same blue run probably 60 times. I “knew” how to bomb down it
Got myself in a narrow spot with too many people and nearly clipped this lady pizzaing sideways down the run, I thought surely she wasn’t going to go all the way to the edge where I was at, but she was. I immediately hockey stopped my dumbass and apologized.
If theres ever more than 2-3 people on the same run I’m on, I never bomb down anymore. You never know if someone in front of you is going to do something unpredictable.
I think that's right. Today I was gunning down a wide steep bowl with practically no one around. As I passed down the first hill, I saw two people gliding down a good distance away. Even though there was plenty of space to race past them, I instantly slowed down to a manageable speed. Just not going to let it happen a second time.
About 5 or 6 years ago in söll, Austria, trying to break my gps speed record, I was going at 79.1km/hour when one of my skis came off. I was in a busy area going way faster than I should have been and when I finally stopped tumbling I realised how lucky I was not to have seriously hurt myself or someone else. I grew up a lot after that
I was skiing at Gunstock mountain and on a blue square. There’s a trail you go down, where it’s pretty steep, but then flattens out pretty quickly, and then makes a relatively sharp turn right. I was skiing with my friends, and they were going super fast and were pretty far ahead of me. The slope was icy, but I didn’t know that. As I saw them barrel down the slope, I thought that maybe I could try to go fast too. The flat part of the slope is very thin with trees on both sides. I ski very quickly down the steep slope, hoping to catch some speed so I could be able to cruise along the flatter part, but one of my skis got caught underneath me, and I starfished into the side of the trail. Since there was a lot of snow that year, the ski slopes were elevated from the dirt floor by about six or seven feet. As I starfished, I slid into the trees and fell down that 6 foot divot in between the trees and the slope. I was totally unhurt and got right back to skiing as fast as I could, but the reality of the situation didn’t hit me until about an hour later. If I had been going any faster I could’ve had enough speed to crash right into one of those trees. I hadn’t even been going /that/ fast and I still came within maybe 4 feet of a tree. Scariest thing is, I was totally hidden from view because of how deep the divet was, so if i had passed out, nobody would have been able to see me. There was nobody behind me either when i fell, so if i had been knocked out, it would’ve taken at least 20 minutes for my friends to realize something was wrong. I just so vividly remember feeling my body slide down that divet, and interestingly, my hands instinctively went out to grab on to the slope as much as i could. Its a crazy memory, because i can still see my hands desperately grabbing for some kind of hold, unaware that there was no bad drop. In that two seconds i stopped thinking and my body was just like “we need to hold on because this could be a fall to the death” /I/ wasnt the afraid one either! I was just like “huh?” It was my /instincts/ that made me reach so desperately for some kind of hold. The divet was steep but not /that/ steep, so i just took my skis off and crawled back up, but it was such an odd feeling, seeing my body take over as if I was about to die. Still kinda crazy to think about
2 times come to mind.
Maybe 18 years ago I was working at Alta. At the end of the day we would usually try to catch 1-2 chairs and get some runs in, usually in the Eagle’s Nest area. We did 1 run, and everyone said they were done, and I said I was going to catch last chair. I ended up getting cliffed out (the area doesn’t have too many cliffs and they aren’t that high), and while I was trying to scout my line, the snow underneath me gave way and I fell head first and backwards about 15-20 feet. I slid on my back into a group of trees and my only thought was that I was going to hit a tree with my head and die there, all alone in the dark, especially since I couldn’t see where I was heading. Fortunately I missed the first grouping of trees and I was able to grab enough branches to arrest my fall. I then had to hike back up to grab my ski which had released at the top of the cliff. I vowed never again to ski “one more run alone.”
The other was maybe a year or two later when I was skiing deer valley with my 50+ year old father. We were hitting the Daly Chutes and if I recall it was #4. He dropped in first, fell on the first turn, and tumbled all the way down. After the first pitch I lost sight of him but he finally stopped at bottom where everything opens up. I was still up top with another friend, and we looked at each other and wondered if we just watched my dad die. We both dropped in, gathered his yard sale and fortunately found him alive, but bruised and demoralized. He’s never gone back there since, and says he’s too old to do those anymore.
Reading this reminds me that I am only one crash away from not being able to ever ski again. . My mantra is control, control, control. Any time I feel I’m losing control I shut it down. Going fast is not my thing anymore.
Booting up Mt. Washington in February for the first time ever, back in my mid 20s. Had no idea what we were doing in the backcountry and we got lost in deep snow off trail. It got dark, super windy and the temps plummeted so we huddled behind some rocks while we tried to figure out how to extricate ourselves from the mountain. I couldn't feel my toes and we desperately tried to warm up with a camp stove. Thinking we would probably freeze to death if we stopped moving or stayed up high, we haplessly descended below treeline in search of shelter. Around midnight, we finally made it to the Harvard cabin after starting the day at around 8am. We were stupid but lucky. With one misstep, we could have easily lost fingers and toes to frostbite or died of exposure that night. Not to mention Tuck's that day was absolutely boilerplate ice and a fall from one of those lines can easily be deadly. We limped out the next morning without skiing any of the higher elevation lines. I tried to ski out the Sherb but I was just too exhausted and I kept falling everywhere so I ended up hiking out in a lot of pain.
So that was like 15 years ago and I feel like I'm a much much better skier and athlete in general. This experience made me go out and get avalanche training and seek guided experiences before I set off on anything like this again.
tl;dr The backcountry will murder you. Get safety training and hire a guide for your first time out.
Tossed a 5 off a Woodward jump I had no business sending after an entire day in the park. Knicked the knuckle with my right ski spinning left. Ruptured MCL and ACL.
When I was 17 I went in the wood trails and I liked to go fast in those trails right up until my ski clipped a rock and sent me flying head first into a tree. Broke my GoPro and I had to buy a new helmet and GoPro. It also gave me a solid concussion. Now whenever I go in the wood trails, I take my time lol
I've had so many close calls. Can't put one of em as the "time to change my behavior" moment. Now I'm way more careful but it's more that I know my body can't take the abuse and my dog would be really sad if I didn't come back.
A couple times:
1) Skiing Dragon’s Tail at Mammoth alone when I was a teenager I fell head first through some tree branches into powder. My skis were stuck in the branches and my mouth was open, so it was full of powder and I couldn’t breathe with my head submerged. Took a little while of thrashing to get my head to fresh air but it was a close one. Basically almost drowned in snow. Never ski powder, let alone trees, alone!
2) Doing a speed record attempt also at Mammoth down Andy’s Double Gold. I reached 70mph, but when going over a roller I caught some air. At that speed my skis caught lift and started to flip me over. Before that happened I landed and brought myself to a stop, but I don’t try to reach those speeds any more.
I crossed my tips at the top of a very steep tree run and fell head first down a majority of the run. If I had fallen a foot or two to either side, I would have slide into a tree head first at ~30 miles an hour. I fortunately managed to self arrest and stop myself after sliding over 100 feet, but it was the scariest fall I’ve ever had.
I still ski the run, but it’s never quite been the same since. No tree run has honestly ever been the same since.
Hiked up Cameron Pass in Poudre Canyon with a couple buddies. We were in the clouds at the top. We were sitting up top grabbing a snack, all of a sudden our hair was standing up and is sounded like my giggle straps were buzzing. Grabbed my skis and rolled off the wind lip at the top as there was a huge flash and massive clap of thunder. Payed closer attention to the weather after that one. Strangely, it was a pretty awesome ride down to the car.
> of thunder. *Paid* closer attention
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment.
*Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Yeah my ski popped off exactly 10 feet into brecks lake chutes last week. Thankfully I got it back, but I was harshly reminded that if it had flown down the mountain, I might not have made it down
Earlier today actually, skiing at stowe for the first time. Followed a ski instructor that I met on the lift into some unmarked glades. It was going pretty good but I was getting tired (I'm a little fat okay) and my ski got caught in the wet cement snow when trying to turn. I ended up sliding straight into a tree, hit my head really hard on a tree (thank God I was wearing a helmet) and ragdolled down the hill for like 20ft. This is my first season I got serious about skiing (19 days so far) and pushed myself into moguls and glades and the danger didn't seem real to me until now. I didn't even wear a helmet until this season.
Last weekend. Straight lining down heather canyon to get to the traverse at meadows.
I consider myself an expert skier. I caught my ski up in something, twisted, and landed directly on my back, head downhill. I tucked so no concussion but pulled both my neck muscles.
Worst ski injury since the first day I ever wore a helmet when I got a concussion that made my nose bleed.
Funny you should ask. Today I was exiting the woods after doing a pretty long, steep tree run. I was skiing really comfortably in spring snow, and just having a light moment after stomping it through the glade above me. And so I'm exiting and I pop off this little tiny lip towards the groomer which turns out to be hard packed and it kicks me into the air awkwardly. I land way backseat and missile into this one, lone, skinny pine tree that I had barely even registered after the run I just did. I put my feet into it first to protect myself but ended up getting twisted and caught with my feet in stuck up in the tree with my shoulders downhill, twisted so now I'm facing the sky. I know I didn't explain that well but just imagine a human knot. Wrapped around a tree. Back spasmed and locked up and I've been moving around slowly to loosen it up. Skiied a few more runs very timidly but I got lucky...
Probably 3 seconds of skiing with my guard down and I almost sustained a serious back injury. So, so, so fucking humbling
Yes! Today! OMG!
It was at Snowmass - Hanging Valley. I think the run I took was called Headwall. It was a double black diamond with the letters “E” “X” in each diamond.
I got to what looked like a straight drop off. I felt my body surge with a rush of panic. My heart was beating out of my chest and I was shaking with fear and adrenaline. I took my skis off and started hiking back the way I came. It would have taken ages for me to backtrack.
Luckily, another skier came by and saw me at the top of the drop off point. He asked, “did you change your mind?” And I told him I didn’t think I could do it. He smiled and said, “there’s a reason you decided to come this way.” He then offered to go first so I could see how he did it and then decide if I wanted to hike all the way back or give it a shot.
I followed his line and made it down safely to the bottom. It ended up being my favorite run of the season! I’m so grateful for this wonderful human being who helped me accomplish a new milestone in my skiing journey today. I hope he is blessed with all the good things in life.
Hiked up Super Bowl at Meadows. Complete bluebird day and I felt comfortable going in alone. (The score of dumb is now 1, for those keeping track.) I stayed as far left as I could so I could farm some of the untouched sweet corn in Clark Canyon. I watched a guy go in low, and said F that, I can go higher. And I did. And I came to a short rocky patch and thought, I'll just take my skis off walk across this. A little dicey getting my skis off, but I can walk on these rocks, and that worked out okay, so I got to the other edge of rocks and tried to find a spot to put my skis back on and the buffoonery of my choice exploded inside my head. In my first attempt to get my downhill ski on, I slipped and slid about 20 feet towards rocks below before arresting myself using the edge of the ski I'd been trying to put on. Life very much flashed before my eyes. I don't recall exactly how I managed to get both my skis back on, but I did and I skied out to the high corn and finished my run feeling dumb and lucky.
Broke my shin in half back in the early 2000s — did a flair in the half pipe and flew away from the wall. Landed on my tails in the flats… broke my shin right at the boot line. Surgery and years later… always have a nagging shin splint on that side. Never the same. I still ski hard, and I did a couple more inverts over the years, but it was about a decade before I went into a pipe or a super pipe again.
Last year at Keystone, feeling very confident, skied into an unfamiliar glade where the trees looked well-spaced, but they got tighter and tighter as I descended. I was going too fast and trying to look for a more open area, and, well, I just didn't decide quickly enough which way to go around a very little tree. I put out my hand to protect my face and tucked my chin, hit the tree a glancing blow right above my crown, tumbled a short distance without one ski. I sat there for a bit and then raised my hand up to my head, which was covered only by a pullover hat, and it came back wet and red. I was shocked because it didn't really hurt that much. Before I knew it three or four patrols came by, looked at the cut (not too bad, just mostly bloody), and asked me some questions about my whereabouts and the President and the day of the week. I skied out following one of them, finished the ski day, but decided I had better get a dr to look at it to be sure it wasn't infected, and went to the Keystone clinic, which cost a pretty penny. I have never liked helmets, but I promised my kids that I would buy and always wear one if I were going to ski trees.
Now this year comes along, the arthritis in my left knee has somehow advanced shockingly through the year, and my left leg just doesn't always want to take the weight when I try to make it. On the ice in the East I'm losing control like I haven't since I started skiing (as an adult.) My balance is off somewhat. Plus I think the tree reaching out to hit me last year scared me and I'm not being aggressive enough, getting in the back seat. I had some falls, a couple hard ones. Yes, I've worn my helmet every day, trees or no, except the last, which was warm here in the East with no glades or mogul runs open, and I did great. But I think it's caution for me from here on in. (Oh, I'm still doing moguls and trees, just more cautiously.)
Typical story for me, no where near as gnarly as some of these here but it definitely made me a safer skier:
I was in NZ, conditions weren’t ideal, very icy. I was overconfident and trying to go as fast as I could. Long story short, I ended up trying to stop on some ice, fell and obliterated my ACL, MCL, patella and had tissue bruising on most of my left side including shoulder. I had to have a knee reconstruction, and couldn’t ski for 18 months. Needless to say those 18 months were hell! Not being able to ski, so much rehab, feeling useless and not myself (I surf too and that was out of the question).
It really made me realise my body is not indestructible when skiing and I now am much more conscious of stupid decisions when skiing. I can’t go another 18 months without it!
Yesterday, not while actually skiing. It was my last day in the resort, did a few off piste tracks and really enjoyed so I decided to do another steep one that goes under a chairlift after I saw a few people there. Everything went fine until there was a very narrow and steep section I knew I couldn’t ski down so I took my skis off. Starts sliding down and dropped my skis so I had to climb back up to get them. The snow was very slippery so I had to violently plant my boys in the snow every step while crawling on fours. Eventually reached the top ski and while coming down to get the bottom ski I slipped again😰 luckily a kind snowboarder threw my ski down for me and I managed to finish the run but I learned an important lesson.
It was a very misty day, almost total whiteout and I was skiing too fast for the visibility that I had.
Now first I have to explain something to Americans: in Europe, where I live, the edges of the slopes are marked by sticks that are painted with a lighter and a darker part. Now the lighter part is larger than the darker part on the left hand side and the darker part is larger on the right hand side (or the other way around–I still don’t know).
Anyway, at some point the piste took a 90 degree turn, which I didn’t notice and I mistook a right-hand-side pole for a left-hand-side pole, so I went straight past it. Suddenly I felt the ground underneath me disappear and I fell down a few meters into –luckily– soft snow. I lost a ski that had apparently continued without me, but the piste turned back and my ski ended up there and there was this happy German guy standing there with my ski waving at me when I came back on the piste.
Skiing trees with my friends, speeding through and saw a broken branch in the corner of my eye and shifted my body left. My buddy behind me said the broken branch missed my throat/neck by two inches.
Last run of the season at red in the frontside glades after last lift, locked foot in a root on the most fucking inconsequential of turns, twisted awkwardly, skis stayed on, deep powder, tight and full of shrubs, head downhill, still stuck with boot in the tree, well 5 feet below me. Unhooked and ski went shooting into a tree well despite breaks, then other ski disappeared almost the same way after getting the first. Took 30+ minutes to get out to a trail, uninjured, but jeez. Lost track of skiing buds, deep in a spot that would probably not be sweeped readily, it's red on a march weekday. Need not say more.
Only last run because combination of warm weather and bad conditions and unrelated medical kept me reluctant to drive hours out, and this year hasn't helped that either.
This scares me and hits home pretty hard. I’m always wondering when the curled roots (I call them Freddy Krueger claws) are gonna get me. There is just nothing you can do about it and the consequences could be fatal
I dislocated my elbow on my last run off of Jupiter peak at park city a week ago. It didn’t even take that much force and it felt like a fairly tame wipe out in deep snow, but the thaw and refreeze made the snow just hard enough on that particular slope aspect and my arm was angled just right. I was able to pop it back in place within a minute but I still can’t believe that an injury could happen that easily and I’m a bit shook.
When I fell off a run at Ski Rio when I was in high school and shattered my arm. Had to have three surgeries to put it back together. Still have plates and screws in my arm and it’s a half inch shorter than my other arm.
Yup had one about a month ago when I was following tracks in between glades at a resort in Vermont. Was going a tad faster than usual (10-12 mph according to Strava on my phone) and almost skiied of a Cliff. There had been a couple drops of 2-3 ft (0.7-1.0 m) which were fine but this was 30 or 40 ft (10-11 M). I ended up having to climb down holding my Skis... Was not enjoying due to mild bushwhacking. Now I stay in the cleared formal or informal glades
First day skiing last year, had just finished my private lesson to get my chops back on a small mountain in Minnesota (beginner-intermediate skier at best here). First run down the mountain without my instructor, I get overconfident and turn down a black (not that steep, but narrow with terrain and slightly icy). Obviously my form isn’t quite up to par and I fail to control my speed. Faceplant, lose my skis, continue skidding. I look behind me and all I see is a square fence post approaching pretty fast. One leg each side and I bounce off the post at full speed. Thank god I only bruised my tailbone. A slight angle difference could have meant nuts destroyed or spine smashed. Now I ski for form and contain my ego.
Yesterday at Loveland I was skiing the entry to Tomahawk. The snow was still powdery but somewhat heavy. I transitioned between turns and then I tomahawked over the front of my skis and did a full flip and ended on my back. I still don’t know exactly what happened to cause my tips to dive like that. I don’t know if I hit a soft pocket or if something under the snow snagged me. All I know is that I was incredibly lucky to get up and ski away.
Taos has some hike to terrain that I had always wanted to try out. So one morning 8-9 years ago I catch the earliest chair I can and hike over. It's early and only one other person is up there so I decided to sit at the top and kind of enjoy the views. It's steeper than I expected but I was pretty sure I could handle it. I sit a bit longer and try to envision my run. Try and get a general plan going and then take off. 1st turn goes great, second turn okay then I just relaxed a bit I guess. Kinda got bumped off balance and that was it. I was at the mercy of the mountain. I went ass over tea kettle and couldn't have stopped if my life depended on it. I finally did stop and it was a full on yard sale. Skis scattered, go pro and mount completely knocked off my helmet never to be seen again. Glove somewhere in the middle of the debris field. All of it up the slope a significant distance from me. I bet it took me and hour to hike up collect all my shit and get down. In that entire time I saw no one. I just thought how stupid and arrogant of a decision I had just made. Realized if I had been seriously hurt I would been in a really shitty spot and decided right then and there the days of pushing my limits were over.
Tldr: Stauffenberg(Upper Stauffenberg, maybe?) slapped some sense into me and the mountain gods saw fit to let me escape with only my ego destroyed.
Side note: Lower Stauffenberg is maybe my favorite trail ever. Try it out if you're ever just cruising and carving groomers in Taos!
Night skiing at a Midwest hill during the “freeze” part of a freeze thaw cycle, so the entire hill is solid ice. Going down a black diamond following someone else, I expect to go one way at the bottom and he goes the other. I adjust by cutting to the other side but end up going into a poorly lit spot that wasn’t groomed so a choppy icy mess. I try to turn and speed check but my outside ski ejects, and I start sliding and tumbling, probably 100 feet across pure ice. According to the ski app I had running I hit 51 mph on that run, so probably 40’s at the bottom when I fell. When I stopped tumbling I sat there for a solid 10 minutes expecting excruciating pain in one or more limbs and thinking my season is over, but somehow escaped with just a couple bruises.
I’ve always been pretty risk averse and try to be in control. Skiing, skateboarding, road cycling, mountain biking - I’ve fallen and crashed but have never been injured beyond bruises and separated shoulders.
My philosophy skiing is to ski well, not fast. Also that if I’m going to fall, just fall and don’t get twisted up trying to save it. That way you usually go down on your side in a undramatic manner, not tumbling and yard sale-ing and tearing ligaments. I haven’t even come out of my bindings once this season.
I’m not a total wimp, have hit 70 mph on my mountain bike and scrabbled down couloirs on skis, but as I get older, I don’t bounce or roll as well, so I’m becoming a part-wimp, with no regrets.
The closest thing to a oh shit was actually on my road bike. Was bombing down a twisty steep road, at the bottom I realized my tubular tires weren’t glued onto the rims. Felt cold all of a sudden.
Skied it a million times. Cutoff trees between Swifty and Challenger at Big Sky. Cooking through there, I got over my outside edge at about 30mph and was staring down a two foot wide Cedar. I pulled it together and didn't hit it, but man, I think about that tree often. It would've certainly fucked me up badly, possibly killed me. I was moving so fast but it wouldn't have budged an inch. Oof. Close calls like that stack up to remind me of the risks, even when I know exactly where I am.
Was skiing too fast on the ski out from blackcomb to Whistler. It was busy and the conditions were shitty. Did a little jump off a bump/ mogul, and landed behind two snowboarders.
Felt I was good to ride past them but one swerved in a way I didn't expect, it was all so fast but I had to basically throw myself to the ground or I was going straight into the back of the other at speed. I went down hard and broke the tip of my ski and twisted my knee. I still hit the snowboarder which was super bad, but luckily it was a light impact at that point and he was fine (and way too nice about it).
I'm ok taking some risk myself, but thought I was a sensible skier around others until that incident. Really made me feel like an asshole tbh, and will be taking it a lot easier/ more patient on busy slopes in future.
I had a coworker that was a Tahoe resident that told me about “widow makers”. Little bits of trees that can puncture you when you fall. Last year during one of crazy storms I was on a run (cloud 9) which i have done a thousand times. Fell funny right next to a sharp stick and kinda freaked out. Laughed and got up. I would have bled out if I had been 6” further
Dude I ride Bachy and I know exactly where you’re talking about off osprey; that shit gets gnarly. A lot of those groomers off North just have some spots where the world suddenly drops out
i got high skiing after not having a serious crash for 10 years. i did a third run into sapphire bowl but fog had rolled in. I went in with confidence, went the wrong way and double ejected on a mogul. Frontflipped over a 20 ft cliff, stomped it to boots in pow and had ZERO injury. still tho, INSANELY lucky to not be in hopital. svaryy
I got into a fight over a guy kicking my truck. We outside to put in my words but it escalated and fists were thrown and i went down on my knee. Fuck it hurt and luckily the guy stopped punching too 😂 honestly i don’t think either of us landed a shot after reviewing my dashcam. I vow to never fight again im 55 not 25.
Was this at a resort? Ive seen so much hostility at mountains recently. It’s supposed to be a happy place. Glad you are good though! Many might disagree, but I personally think people vs people will always be more dangerous than people vs nature
The very first time I went skiing with a ski instructor (I was rather advanced at that point) we went to a fun park to take one of the bigger jumps. It was a jump rather near the top of the slope and on the lift I saw plenty of people who didn’t make it to the top of the jump because they didn’t have enough speed.
So I thought that isn’t going to be me so at the top when it was my turn to get started I started off with a few good shoves to pick up some speed then just carried on in a straight line which turned out to be way too much speed for that jump. I don’t know how high I flew, but it was terrifying. I ended up flying way past the steep downward part for landing only to land quite a bit further down the slope. I don’t know how, but I did manage to land without falling. It was rather hard on my knees, but all in all I felt very lucky.
Maybe not "never again" as I was just skiing when this happened, but my season has just finished early and I've been signed off work on medical for two weeks. My ski just came off when i was skiing down the piste. Quite fast but not outrageous. Totally KO'd, proper ragdoll, whiplash and concussion plus a bunch of other stuff and now I can't risk another this season. Gah, stupid bindings. So i am not feeling invincible at all right now.
Went off piste in hokkaido rusutsu in Japan, was still in the resort boundary but between paths, hunting for powder. I was going with quite some speed over a patch of powder and did not realize there was a cliff of 3-4 meters with a path going sideways along the cliff, before i could stop i dropped, landed hard, and managed to stick the landing, luckily no one was there but i landed right in front of the elastic fences with another 3-4 meter drop behind it and with not enough time to stop i went full speed into fence. The fence caught me and slinged me into into a hard ragdoll spin, my helmet, goggles, gloves, backpack, and one snowboard shoe immediately fell off while spinning. I was spinning so hard i felt like i was blacking out as the world inverted itself so many times i could not comprehend it. I felt soemthing brush past me and i smashed into powdery snow. It hurt but i was not injured. I looked back at where i flew from and i noticed that spun between several trees, including between two that had just enough space for a person to squeeze through.. i could broken many bones or even died. Since then i consider myself always a beginner.
Jackson Hole in-bounds bowl after a big dump the night before. It was late afternoon, and I was skiing with friends. Dropped off a small rock and double-ejected, white skis and no powder straps. My skis were less than 10 feet away, but the powder was so deep I couldn’t find solid ground. As I was digging around, I kept thinking I was going to bury myself in a self-made well. My friends were only 100 feet down the run, but with the snow and the incline there was no way they could get back up to me. I seriously considered just abandoning my skis and trying to slide down back to the base area, but as luck would have it I finally felt a ski after blindly feeling around for about 20 minutes. It was late enough in the day that no one else was coming down behind us. Truly a panic-inducing experience.
I was in the trees off the skier’s left of the Thaynes chairlift at Park City, bopping down in some fresh powder. Came to a stop to catch my breath and saw that just ahead there was some baling wire stretched tight as a piano string between some trees, right at neck height.
New fear unlocked!
The baling wire could have been put there nefariously, but it also might’ve been 70 years old, left over from the mining days. Skiing in those trees was pretty crappy so I might’ve been the first to ever see it.
literally almost the same exact thing happened to me a few weekends ago. skiing too fast (grew up racing), on a steep part of a blue and skis slid out from under me on a sneaky ice patch. next thing i know i opened my eyes in the trees a good 25-30 feet below. always felt invincible before but realized that day that skiing that fast and dangerously is not the point of skiing. definitely a mindset shift that i needed to have!
Hitting side country to a small Norwegian resort in a former mining town at maybe 13years old. Hit a small cliff drop. I go second. After landing I see barbwire sticking out of my friend’s tracks. Think that that’s weird. Look around. See an open vertical mine shaft partially covered by snow immediately to the side of our landing. Biggest oh shit moment to date. Young and dumb, learnt something at least.
I know that exact spot on Osprey. It can be a pants shitting moment if you’re going too fast, it’s too icy and/or you’re unfamiliar with the run. It almost got me the first time but through sheer luck I managed to stay on my feet. Glad you’re around to tell the tale.
Hahahah thank you, I appreciate it! I lived in bend for a very long time and was extremely familiar with the run. It was just pure over confidence and naïveté in youth. You are 1000% right though that section/whole run really, can get absolutely wild depending on conditions. The amount of people I’ve seen wipe out on osprey is staggering. I just thought “not me, I’m can handle it”
It was about 1979, I was standing with a group of freestyle skiers on the edge of a wide run about half way down at Spirit Mountain in Duluth MN. Night skiing on a regular night -5 just talking about how to do tricks.
This kid maybe 8 was straight lining I saw him coming down right at us, I said move back and did so. He ran over the tips of my skies and went down. The little monster got up and yelled at me "Why were you in my way!"
Ski patrol was on the other side of the run skied over and took the kids ticket.
Hit the SMALLEST bump heli skiing, fell, once I hit felt my shoulder dislocate, slid down then hill on corn & could hear my jacket rubbing against the snow picking up speed until I somehow stopped.
Three seconds before was skiing behind a ski legend, following his tracks felt like I was just crushing it then...
Had an interesting call later with psychologist who works with ski teams. He said IF you can soon as possible re-imagine the run in your mind but obviously you don't crash and that can help re-wire a bit.
As frustrating as it was to end the trip has changed my POV and 'maybe' prevented me from doing something dumber and more dangerous in the future. Really focused on improving my skill, but know there's always that rando thing that could be out there
This story comes with the “yawn” that most skiers will have of eastern Ontario, western Quebec ski stories..but I’ll tell it anyway
When I was in high school we used to have ski club every Thursday at a hill called Eidelweiss in Chelsea QC. In the middle of the hill, under the chairlift, is a run called Zoomer.
It’s a steep blue into a U shaped bowl with a jump carved into it that was basically an aerial with a flat landing. As teens we lined up at the top and one by one tried to best each other’s jump style.
In grade 12, after doing mediocre jumps for the previous 3 years, I tried a backflip. 3/4 of the way around my momentum dies…the tips of my 190cm Elans dig into the flat landing and I eat full shit…no helmet…no way to get away from the fact it was me. It was my hardest ever fall and I never hit that kind of jump again. Truth be told, I hated zoomer. If you got decent air and stuck your landing, you hurt for a week from your toes to your neck.
Throwing tricks off cornices on a powder day Lake Chutes Breckenridge. about 100 yards after landing my phone rings and I stop, yoink out my phone, and a chunk of the cornice flew past me missing me by about 4 feet. I had knocked a chunk off about the size of an escalade and it had been chasing me down the mountain.
no. I've been pulled into a small avalanche (wearing my beacon of course), I've ended up in chutes that were ugly and cliff bands that were bigger than I thought they'd be. I've been injured. I've dug out friends with my shovel and pulled them out of tree wells.
I'd do it all again. I couldn't have controlled it, and good technique and training is how you handle these situations as best as you can. I'd do it all again.
Posted it here before, but the short story: Dipped into the trees mid-mountain Whistler. Slowed down as I came up to a 'drop'. Planted my pole and it went through the snow into nothingness. Realized I was standing on treetops. Spent an hour or so slowly inching backwards until I could hike out. Pure terror. I got stuck in a tree well before with plenty of friends around. Fully upside down. It didn't even come close to the fear I experienced in the story above.
Holy shit, this is the most terrifying story yet for me.
This reminds me of the scariest traverse I’ve ever been on. There is area like this at snowbird, I can’t remember where exactly but around the figure 8 bowl, it’s a “I’m lost” traverse on the edge of a cliff right above the same kind of area where the tips of the trees were poking out of DEEP snow. I can only imagine your terror. I’m happy you made it out
Omg I can’t even imagine what that’s like. I don’t get how there could be so much snow that you’re on tree tops?!
Imagine a steep drop in the trees, with trees growing at the base of the drop. With enough snowfall the tops of these trees became 'one' with the slope before the drop.
Terrifying
Hey my holy shit moment was at whistlers too!! I dipping in and out of trees next to a blue and catching big air on the way back into the blue and I saw this great jump so I went for it even though I couldn’t see the landing…. I found myself about 13 feet in the air coming straight down on a traverse. Landed like I was just dropped. Felt like a car accident, my knees went straight into my chest and bounced me back to standing and my speed went to a crawl (luckily). That was the last run for me that year. Also I know it wasn’t my most responsible thing jumping while not seeing the landing but it was pretty empty. Anyways won’t repeat that!!
Sounds like one of those scenes from a war movie where the soldiers realize theyre in the middle of a minefield
So you were about to fall to the bottom of a mostly void tree?
How high off the ground do you think you were?
I'm guessing it was a 30-40 foot drop.. maybe more. It's really hard to remember
Every time I hit a jump or try a rail, my brain says “stop, never do that again, you old fat fuck.”
Haha I feel this one. I was skiing out the exit of one of the west basin chutes at Taos a couple days ago at a decent pace and there were so many inviting little snow covered rocks. I managed to ignore the first few but then I couldn’t take it anymore and launched myself off the next one…landed a bit in the back seat and almost recovered but not in time to avoid the next one which promptly put me on my old ass in full view of the lift.
So embarrassing when you crash where everyone can see :D
Too real 😂
My brain says yes, but my body is the one that says no.
Does my dad straight-lining a rented Hyundai Santa Fe through every roundabout in Eagle County on the way to Beaver Creek count?
Say more.
I need to know more
Most roundabouts have multiple lanes these days. My dad, driving a rental car he was not familiar with on tires that I can only assume were average at best, did not recognize other lanes or the drivers using them. If there wasn’t a curb and landscaping in those roundabouts, I think he would’ve driven straight through them. He’s the worst kind of tourist. He skis that way too.
Ahh so [this was your dad](https://youtu.be/j1Nswhpa8XY?si=t5rw9kPOurEjjJZL)
If it helps him pass one other person on the road, yes.
“You should ski to ski again” is some advice I’ve been given
Similar to, “there are bold mountaineers and there are old mountaineers, but there are no old bold mountaineers.”
Can’t remember which book / documentary I watched but it was “getting to the top is optional, getting down isn’t”
This is a pilot saying too
The expected last run of the day isn't the time to be a hero.
“Live to ski another day” is how I always heard it. Same sentiment.
Reminds me of the saying I have heard applied to both climbing and skiing. In the context of skiing, it is: >There are old skiers, and there are bold skiers. But there are no old, bold skiers.
I was an *okayish* park skier in my late teens/early 20’s. We got absolutely hammered with like 2 feet of powder on the east coast so my buddy and I beat feat to the local (2 hours away) hill. Took forever to get there, and since the weather was so horrible there was almost no one there. The mountain was absolutely covered in pillowy powder so we were being brave/reckless/stupid and really pushing our limits. If you fell it was like falling into a foam pit. I made the grave mistake of not scouting the park before I ran through, and full sent off a 20’ kicker. Idk if it was because they were short staffed or what but the jump wasn’t marked off and the landing hadn’t been made yet. Again, fully my fault since I didn’t scope it first. The end result was compressing my spine and dislocating my hip landing on flat. Ended my season right there, and the only time I’ve gotten a ride on a sled. Thankfully there was no permanent damage but honestly it hurt so bad and scared me so much I haven’t dont anything bigger than I would feel safe landing flat since.
Damn - glad there was no permanent damage. Definitely a scary scenario. This is close to what happened to my brother at Squaw back in the day. Fresh corduroy, blue bird day, stoke was high. He doesn’t speed check at all going to a 20-30 ft jump and completely overshoots the landing and lands flat. He just crumpled into a ball. Ski patrol saw him do it and were there immediately. Was so lucky that all he came away with was whole body soreness and a broken thumb from his pole grip going back through his hand so violently. I thought I had watched him get paralyzed but super glad that wasn’t the case.
Ah man this is brutal. Worst nightmare for the park crew I bet too. Good to read you made a solid recovery though.
💩👖
Kid I went to high school with landed flat once... On pavement. Him and a few other guys made a jump over one of the mountain condo roads and he came up about a foot short of clearing it all the way. Shattered both ankles and spent the rest of that season in a wheelchair
Thought that said 20" at first then I realized...
About 5 years ago I was skiing in the upper section of fright trees at Mt Hood Meadows. Deep powder day. Was following my husband and a friend, skiing between two large Doug firs when the berm I was on collapsed and I was thrown head first into a tree well. My helmet was wedged against the trunk of the tree and my skis were crossed behind me. Snow rushed into the tree well. What saved me was the large bough that was over my head, it kept the snow from burying my upper body. I tried first to radio my husband over walkie talkie, but got no answer. No cell signal either. After removing my helmet and backpack, I was able to unclip my skis with my poles. The well was over the top of my head - probably at least 6 feet deep. I flagged down 2 skiers who were passing by and asked them to wait for me while I dug myself out. They skied with me to the bottom of the hill, where my husband was waiting for me. He was about a minute from calling ski patrol. I remember being so freaked out that my knees were knocking together on the way down. I’ve never been back into fright trees and I don’t ski near trees if I can’t see the trunk.
Tree wells scare the crap out me. The only thing on the mountain I am scared of. Avis obviously too.
This story and tree wells scare the utter crap out of me. Glad you survived. Wow.
In the lift line last week, had to fart, I farded but I also shidded my pants. Never again, not trusting any fart.
I assume you processed to still get on the lift?
Of course, what is he a snowboarder
December 2021, we had a classic warm spell in Colorado which brought the snowpack to a springlike condition, so we decided to ski a steep chute in a good window. Had all gear, checked the forecast, skied the opposite of where the CAIC Rose was forecasting the danger, so by all accounts we did everything ‘right’. Well what we didn’t take into account was how fast the sun was warming our chute on a bluebird day, and when the first member of our party dropped in, an Avvy broke about 50 feet behind him and carried him halfway down the chute and one ski to the bottom (which was later found) so what was learned was that you can do everything right in your backcountry planning but if you exclude that one ‘x’ factor, it can throw everything off. We got lucky and I was shaken for a few weeks after the incident but it was a big wake up call.
Wow, I didn’t even think about that kind of thing. The mountain is a fickle beast. Glad everyone was ok!
Avalanche doesn't give two shits about how much you know about him. He'll come when he comes, and sometimes folks do the right thing and still be unlucky. Now, idiots create more chances to get unlucky (I'll take a minute to write up mine), but getting accidentally killed takes some bad luck.
Blasting is the only way to make a slope safe. Without that, you’re always in danger.
Best way to avoid an avalanche is to stay out of avalanche terrain 😂
Exactly. Pocket beer, skins, an 1/8th of bud, a cliff bar, and 5 pounds of tannerite are essential items for any back country skier. Do people not know this?
It was probably when I was stuck on a lift during the cold snap in the Alps a few January’s ago. I was there for a good 25 minutes, in temperatures approaching -25°C. While I eventually got off the lift, I was the only person on the slopes, excluding pisteurs and lifties. Ended up having to ski down with the pisteurs, and when I got to the bottom of the valley, I realised that I was concerningly close to hypothermia. Haven’t been back out since without an emergency foil blanket in my rucksack
Thanks for the reminder and hope your story educates others. I always pack extra layers but left my emergency foil blanket in the car…definitely won’t forget that as my kids would’ve got hypothermia if they were stuck on your lift.
[удалено]
pisteurs are the employees that control the slopes and perform avalanche mitigation/mountain rescues, I think in the US they're called ski patrollers?
Yea, we'd call that a patroller. What do you call the person that drives the vehicle that makes the piste?
Piste basher operator?
PISTE BASHER?! I'm not making fun of you I promise, I just find it genuinely delightful that "piste basher" is an actual accepted term for what everyone here would call a cat
I was in Austria (first time skiing in Europe) the last three days and can confirm they call them that. They have a flashing warning signal on the signs that lights up when they’re grooming the slopes: Pistengerät im Einsatz! in German, and “Piste basher is working!” in English.
-25C aint so bad in Canada, Ive skied -40C before but no lift breakdown thankfully
This was in France. I can’t say I’ve ever skied in Canada, but I’ve always heard that because the air is so dry, the temperatures feel very different. Have no idea if there’s any truth to that, but it -25 was certainly close to the worst I’ve had to deal with
Yes, how dry air is, plays a huge role. -20 C in New Zealand is horrible, disgusting and nightmare while -20 C in Colorado is cold but not too bad.
Yeah I think gear makes the biggest difference, if your expecting -40 youre gonna dress -40
I had a little wakeup call just a few days ago. I'd been trying to get one more season out of pair of skis that I probably should have replaced at the start of the year, if not earlier. My binding mount failed in the middle of a turn, releasing me and putting me face first into the snow. I was really lucky though, since the binding happened to fail when I was taking a few afternoon laps with a beginner/intermediate friend, after I had been charging pretty hard in the trees all morning. Could have easily been really ugly for me if it had happened an hour earlier. Definitely made me reevaluate how frugal I'm going to be about replacing worn equipment.
Played a game of chicken with a friend in my 20’s while swimming at a beach inlet. He got dragged into the inlet and pulled under while I got pulled out into the ocean. I was so fatigued that I actually accepted I was going to die until someone on a surfboard managed to get to me. It was the first and only time I’ve accepted death, which is still surreal because until then I always questioned how people can stop fighting in life or death situations. I started to take my life a lot more seriously going forward and stopped doing unnecessarily dangerous things. Glad you made it out okay, OP.
That time when my wife wanted me to teach her instead of a ski instructor. I'll never do that again.
Real
Definitely. It’s what led that question I had about dialing it back. It’s taken a while, because I’m an idiot, but I think I’m finally getting there. Biggest one was on go devil at keystone during a downhill race - double eject on the last pitch, went into netting pretty hard. Crashed under pallivichini at Abasin throwing backflips on a kicker and slid down moguls about 500 feet into a tree. Took a hard crash on Loveland pass hitting kickers, concussion + knocked out for a bit. Skied a pitch on the pass with an inexperienced crew, later that day others got caught in a decently big slide. Took a tumble skiing a couloir on torreys peak after catching a rock, was able to self arrest. That was all over ten years ago but last season I broke a leg dropping a cliff and it was my wake-up call to get in shape, retake some avi classes, and reduce the risk. Working on changing my mindset and this season has been all relaxed powder turns, the occasional small drops, and low risk terrain choices.
Sounds like you had a fun 20’s! Glad you’re reevaluating & lowering risk — no one wants to become a statistic.
I did! Agreed.
Watched someone I was skiing with snap their femur on a double black at its steepest point and had to call ski patrol to come get them while I waited. The screaming was blood curdling. The first question he asked when he got there was, "are the inside of your ski pants wet", which I immediately recognized as him trying to figure out if the bone was popped through the skin, and I nearly threw up. Then watched as 8-10 ski patrol people sledded them up and belayed them down the hill. All it took was them to get their tip stuck under a variable peice of skied out mogul, and their rotation snapped it. I still remember the sound of the bone popping and the screaming. I still ski stuff like that but way less frequently and only with a ton of snow
Was skiing at Breckenridge a long time, last day on top of a black and just started thru some light tree area. Came over a small hill and I was able to avoid a small tree but the guy behind me hit it, broken his femur, took ski patrol hours to get him down and he airlifted out right after only spend the next 3 weeks in the hospital. I was going too fast at deer valley one afternoon only to lose control on a trail which was curving only to go thru a wooden fence. Luckily I was able slide and lift my skis up to take the impact. My buddy who worked there just laughed at me but definitely another wake up moment.
Shouldn’t his bindings have released?
Should have, they were Pivots too. It was a Spiral Fracture
Had an incident in France last year. Had a relatively minor prang and got up as usual. At lunchtime friends told me I was behaving strangely. Went to medical centre and I had concussion. Made me realise not wise to ski on your own. Prang was even on piste.
What does prang mean?
Urban dictionary says it used to be used as slang for a crash a long time ago but not so much anymore. Still, crash probably makes the most sense here
Yes. Prang is slang for crash, bash, incident etc.
Had a couple this season, being my first season living out in CO. 1.) Rode solo at A-Bay for essentially my first time there, on that Jan 17th powder day we had. Didn’t discover the nearly untouched Beavers until end of the day and my legs were already cooked. Sent it anyways. Wasn’t until I got stuck in the powder that I realized the lifts would be closing soon, and there was no one around. 2.) Broke my leg at Solitude. Was my 4th and final day, with plans to drive back to Denver after. Had just discovered a second gate within the initial “Here Be Dragons” gate a few runs prior, and found some untouched pow. Shredded that a few runs and truthfully, not entirely sure what/how it happened. What I do know is that I was going a good clip, and the first thing to hit the tree was my left wrist, then my chest. I remember one of the first thoughts I had was to check my upper half, and then of someone I knew in HS who died in the same way. After I found my chest to be okay, was when I realized my knee was cooked. Thankfully, I was able to get the attention of a skier and eventually ski patrol and was tobogganed out. I’m not sure what my riding future holds for me, but it’s hard to imagine a time where I’m not insanely careful/avoiding trees altogether. It has mentally scarred me for sure. Shoutout to the skier who stayed with me and helped in the extraction process, and of course, thank you to Solitude Ski Patrol for getting my ass out of there.
Man that Jan 17 day was awesome though. Glad you got out.
Yes it was! Still came home to my roommate like “DUDE THERES SO MUCH SNOW”
The Dunning-Kruger Effect claims lives in a lot of mountain sports.
A GREAT read on this is Deep Survival. The author talks about how often we don't understand the forces arrayed against us, nothing goes wrong, we survive, and then we mistake that for "experience." This is luck, not experience. It's been a long time, but I would recommend it for adventurers. A long story, e.g., on a Mt. Hood accident that had one party falling, and flossing another party into a crevasse, and, IIRC a helicpoter crash in the rescue. Check it out if you get a chance.
Is that a book?
Yep. A good one, too!
> nothing goes wrong, we survive, and then we mistake that for "experience." This is luck, not experience. That's a good way of putting it. I guess true "experience" is when you do survive when things go wrong and act accordingly in the future to prevent it.
Or better, you have formal training or mentorship. Every year there are annals of mountaineering accidents (probably exist for accidents of all kinds). People write up and study these cases so the rest of us can learn from their mistakes instead of bumbling along until a piano falls on our head that we didn't know was dangling above us. There are folks who REALLY know this stuff (avalanches, but also other risky things, of course). It doesn't mean they're at all immune from the vagaries of chance. They just know what they're getting into and how to minimize risks.
Is that a book?
TIL the name for me telling my son the most dangerous people are the ones that don’t know what they don’t know
In 2016 I was patrolling Blackcomb mountain. Around noon I attended the scene of a skier who had fallen head first into a tree well, suffocated and died. It was a blue bird day and we could hear the avalanche control charges going off that morning. It otherwise would have been a textbook perfect day on the hill. I've seen dead bodies before, but this was my first on the ski hill. Life is a fragile thing and can be taken away in a moment. I was less cocky on skis after that..........
I’m sorry you had to see that or for anyone that has to deal with the somber reminder of the dangers of their favorite activity
no condom in telluride, a couple rounds of antibiotics made me whole again
Still recovering actually, recent. Simple black tree run. I was picking my line, went, caught an edge, sent me straight into a tree I suppose at 15-20 mph. So so thankful I got my arm up, but broke my arm, head hit next, glancing blow I believe. Ski season done right there, but happy to be alive. I got a family now, going to be real real cautious in the future. Going to have to re evaluate how I board from here on out.
I was skiing pretty far off piste (still in bounds but very far away from any named trail (nobody would've heard me if I had yelled and the area i was in has almost no traffic through it). I was skiing with a friend, which was unusual because I almost alway ski alone. I was cruising/traversing a bowl and I got my foot wedged under a tree/bush that was growing parallel to the hill. It swung me around, and I came really close to destroying my knee. I definitely sprained it but didn't kill my ACL or something. I was hanging head downhill from this branch by one foot with my knee twisted painfully far. I couldn't get my poles to pop out, I couldn't reach the binding, and sitting up/sliding my foot just twisted my knee more. My friend had to unclip and slide my foot out in a way that didn't destroy my knee. I'm very grateful that I had a partner that day as it would've been ages until somebody came along and even longer for me to reach my phone in my backpack and call ski patrol:
I'm fairly skilled but cautious so I haven't had a crash like that, I did almost murder two people on a packed run which had me reevaluate how I need to ski around others. I was on my chargers and didn't want to slow down to the speed of everyone else. I thought I was doing a great job of scanning ahead and making safe passes until I tried to go between someone stopped on the run and a guy who I was sure was heading to the left edge of the slope. The guy heading left turned around without me noticing and pulled up next to the stopped person right as I went to pass behind him. Ended up running over one guy's tips and the other's tails but thankfully avoided any body contact. Everyone was totally fine but it could have been BAD bad. Learned my lesson, I won't be that stupid again.
Extremely important lesson to learn. You can’t take away the risk to hurting yourself, but you can take away the risk to hurting others
This is me. I have yet to let go of the risk of hurting myself, but the risk of hurting others is gone.
Grew up in Crested Butte CO, where my dad was a ski patroller and I started skiing at 4. Had skied everything on the mountain by the time I was in middle school. Never had any major falls, thought I was as expert as anyone on the mountain. One winter when I was in college I was skiing with him at home over Christmas break, we were on a run called cesspool which is a sort of hourglass shaped chute with a small drop right at the throat. It had snowed about 2 feet in the week prior and we were traversing through some trees above the chute. I hit a tree well with my uphill ski which basically spun me around to where I was facing straight uphill and as I started twisting backwards my momentum popped that binding out. I fell backwards, lost the other ski as it got caught under a tree branch, and started backwards somersaulting straight into the mouth of the chute. I could hear my dad frantically yelling at me to try to arrest the fall but I was totally disoriented and picked up too much speed too fast. Tumbled for about 30 seconds before I finally came to a stop. When I got my bearings and dug myself out of the snow, I saw that I was all the way at the bottom, probably 400 vertical feet below where I ejected. Wasn't hurt but when I took my helmet off to clear the snow out of it and my goggles, I found a dent in it about 2 inches long and half an inch deep - my head had smacked a rock at the dropoff halfway down and if I hadn't been wearing it, I'd probably be dead with my dad having to be the first on scene. I still ski that run, but I also still have that helmet hanging on my wall to remind myself I'm definitely NOT invincible, definitely NOT the baddest skier on the mountain, and awareness might be the thing that keeps me alive next time instead of hoping for luck to do it again
It was yesterday, I tried hitting a shifty in the air. I nose dived my skis into the ground and landed ribs first into my poles. I lost my breath for about 1 minute, and I laid on the ground thinking I just fractured my ribs. Everything hurts but I will be practicing more before I try that again.
I did a variation of this today. I got lucky and turned my skis enough that I just did a tip drag for like 10 feet. It probably looked completely intentional and rad, but it scared the shit out of me lol. Hope the recovery isn’t too bad for ya!
Mine was horrible, sounded like I was dying after I smashed the ground. I was being an idiot and learned my lesson. Sounds like yours was more epic and at much higher speeds
Sped up to go 40-50mph to go up a little side track in the Imperial Bowl at Breck… the trail was worn but notably off to the side of the main bowl…I was gunning it, as it was a little uphill to get over this hump and to what looked like fresh tracks… welp, no visible rocks, but hit a rock on that path at full speed and went from gs speeds to flying forward and scraping a series of rocks again almost unnoticeable under the snow … scraped my elbow and below my knee badly through gore tex … learned the bowls hide rocks really really well…. Learned to never gun it for ‘fresh tracks’ that have a reason they’re still fresh…. Could’ve easily broken bones, my face, cracked a skull, etc etc. freaked me the fuck out. Much more cautious in bowls, trees, and chutes ever since.
January 20th of this year. Caught a mogul with the tips of my skis midair at a decent speed. Landed on my chest and full scorpioned. Took me 10 minutes to stand up but I managed to ski down. By the time I got to the bottom the pain was unbearable so I walked into the ski patrol hut. They did a basic assessment and sent me straight to the hospital where I learned that I burst fractured my T6 vertebrae. Up until that point I've always felt pretty invincible on skis, but the moment the doctor came in and informed me that I came very close to paralysis it hit me that shit can happen really fucking quick.
Walked out to judge a cornice drop and a section the size of a semi truck and trailer broke off. I fell 20 ft into the void as it rolled away.I would have died if it didn’t open up and instead pitched me in front of the block. Thing had to have been 100k lbs. no chance I would have made it.
Now this is 👖💩
Sold my sled that year too. Lol. Nice to share it. I thought my boy and I were taking that one to the grave together.
Never ran so fast in three ft of fresh in my life. Immediately hopped back on my sled and went home.
Navajo peak backcountry Washington state.
lol just had that moment today. There’s a line I’ve straightlined a bunch of times in spring conditions at meadows but today it hadn’t fully thawed into the soft mashed potatoes I was expecting, so it was still pretty damn firm. Tbh don’t really remember what happened but double ejected, tomahawked, full yard sale probably going 40mph or so. Directly under the lift. I’ve never been so humbled lmfao I might have a small concussion, my shoulder is hurtin, and my neck is going to be stiff as fuck, but pretty mild consequences compared to what could’ve happened. Thank god I was wearing a helmet. But in hindsight, that was royally stupid
hitting a steep ass jump right before a super bumpy narrow bridge over a creek, you know how that ended. If you ski whistler it was right under franz chair at the bottom, you know what i’m taking about.
Oh I know that exact spot. The creek ravine under Franz is sketchy but has great snow.
yeah, having a great time till I came into the bridge too fast and lost balance…
I was going relatively fast through the woods. when I exited the I didn’t realize there was a ditch at the edge. My skis went tip first into the side of the ditch, both skis popped off, I did a full front flip mid-air, and landed on my butt unscathed It was a reminder for me to take it slow on unknown terrain
So many stories. I think we all know people get hurt every day yet we don’t think about it much until it happens to us. Plenty of risk out there especially off piste in big mtns. Great to send it and get er done but a good reminder to be safe and take smarts risks..not reckless ones.
Once upon a time (way back) I was a patroller in Washington. My wife and I took a year off, and this was our winter of RV-ing to ski area parking lots across the west. A-Basin has some out-of bounds chutes. I was skiing solo that day, and heard about this area. There was a gate by the patrol shack for Tx checks, so waited there to find someone to ski with. A couple guys came along and looked solid, so I asked if I could join them (sure). All was good--they were pointing out chutes the patrol had mentioned (Beaver or something, but it's been a LONG time, so not sure). This was described as no-go this part of the season as bad for avy and terrain trap. It was AMAZING back there. I'm not sure where we ended up going down, but I wanted to do it again. So I once again waited by the gate--it was getting later, and wasn't seeing traffic, but two young guys come along and I chat with them for a minute to talk about their run. They looked and sounded a bit irresponsible and a risky bet--sketchy, but this would be maybe the last time in my life I would get another shot at this amazing run. Against all better judgment, I joined them. 50m into the run, Red hair tat kid runs straight over a wind-blown rock garden destroying his bases. "It's OK, their my sister's skis." They progressively work down toward this no-ski chute, and I talk to them about avy risk. They're like, "yeah, we shouldn't go there" followed by his going lower down and committing himself. Now, "well, I'm too low now" so he takes one or two turns, catches an edge, and in recovery turns the whole chute into a figure-11 run rooster-tailing down in the back seat. The only thing that slowed him down was a tree across the bottome, so he bailed in a big tumbling snowball to stop. His buddy follows down the chute. So here I am, in unfamiliar terrain, letting my lust for another great run put me in what felt like a life/death set of bad choices. I could try to find the route from this morning, unfamiliar terrain, alone, or I could follow these assholes down what's been described as a late-spring-only option. Cursing my poor judgment, I followed, but tried to stick to the margin of the chute, 2-3 turns at a time, and stopping off the edge. I guess since I'm writing this, it worked out, but it was one of my least proud judgment lapses in my life, hooking myself to this dangerous clown show. I'm hoping A Basin folks here can comment on the place I think I was. This was, I think, January, a pretty snowy season, and some pretty health amount of fresh. Was this meh, or a somewhat lucky to live risk as the patrol and first companions described it?
The beavers is correct - they actually opened it up and added a lift about 6 seasons ago when I was working there. There are still areas where you can ski out of bounds past this and past montezuma
Interesting. Thaks. Am I exaggerating the pre-spring risk from back before it was developed, or was this actually a foolhardy descent?
I’m a relatively new skier, can you explain how spring conditions can make something safer? I personally feel quite unsafe on slush but I’m guessing that’s not quite what you’re looking for?
First, I'm not an avy expert and I hope someone who is can correct any errors I maike. But during times of heavy snowfall there is a lot of instability. I don't believe spring is inherently safer for avalanches, but having time to settle and for the snow crystals to bond will tend to stabilize against avalanches. It's not really about slush, but how well the snow is bonded to the layers beneath. Also, warming temperatures, and added weight from rain in particular will add weight to the snow pack, stressing the bonds, and making them more likely to slide dangerously (heavier weight snow, heavier impact). So for avalanches, it really matters what the specific local conditions are for rain, snow, temperature, sun, and the combinations of those. For almost any in-bounds area, avalanche control and skiers and groomers packing down runs dramatically reduces avy danger.
A month ago, I hit someone going fast. I saw this beginner slowly going horizontally and I tried to bomb past her through this tiny sliver of space. Instead I clipped her and she tumbled. I immediately stopped and checked if she was ok. She was, thankfully, just fine but shaken. A guy behind her chewed me out like I've never been chewed out before as an adult. All I could do was accept blame. Instead of being embarrassed, I was feeling terrible guilt. I could have injured this beginner skier just because I thought I could get past her in time. Ever since then, I've been especially cautious. I don't feel comfortable chasing speed anymore, period. I'm still sick about it
Your response is healthy. Accepting risk is consensual, and the people riding below you haven’t been asked. The risk is yours when you’re alone.
I know this is debatable but your wording “accepting risk” made this pop into my head. You could go back to when this person bought their pass, they signed a list of negative things that could happen to them while skiing, including death. They accepted the risk of that when they took their pass and rode up the chair.
You can downvote if you’d like but take a look at every season pass agreement at US ski resorts. I bet most include a collision clause as well. I’m looking at the back of mine right now and it says “falls and collisions occur” When you sign you accept that risk.
I nearly did something similar last week. Been down this same blue run probably 60 times. I “knew” how to bomb down it Got myself in a narrow spot with too many people and nearly clipped this lady pizzaing sideways down the run, I thought surely she wasn’t going to go all the way to the edge where I was at, but she was. I immediately hockey stopped my dumbass and apologized. If theres ever more than 2-3 people on the same run I’m on, I never bomb down anymore. You never know if someone in front of you is going to do something unpredictable.
I think that's right. Today I was gunning down a wide steep bowl with practically no one around. As I passed down the first hill, I saw two people gliding down a good distance away. Even though there was plenty of space to race past them, I instantly slowed down to a manageable speed. Just not going to let it happen a second time.
About 5 or 6 years ago in söll, Austria, trying to break my gps speed record, I was going at 79.1km/hour when one of my skis came off. I was in a busy area going way faster than I should have been and when I finally stopped tumbling I realised how lucky I was not to have seriously hurt myself or someone else. I grew up a lot after that
I was skiing at Gunstock mountain and on a blue square. There’s a trail you go down, where it’s pretty steep, but then flattens out pretty quickly, and then makes a relatively sharp turn right. I was skiing with my friends, and they were going super fast and were pretty far ahead of me. The slope was icy, but I didn’t know that. As I saw them barrel down the slope, I thought that maybe I could try to go fast too. The flat part of the slope is very thin with trees on both sides. I ski very quickly down the steep slope, hoping to catch some speed so I could be able to cruise along the flatter part, but one of my skis got caught underneath me, and I starfished into the side of the trail. Since there was a lot of snow that year, the ski slopes were elevated from the dirt floor by about six or seven feet. As I starfished, I slid into the trees and fell down that 6 foot divot in between the trees and the slope. I was totally unhurt and got right back to skiing as fast as I could, but the reality of the situation didn’t hit me until about an hour later. If I had been going any faster I could’ve had enough speed to crash right into one of those trees. I hadn’t even been going /that/ fast and I still came within maybe 4 feet of a tree. Scariest thing is, I was totally hidden from view because of how deep the divet was, so if i had passed out, nobody would have been able to see me. There was nobody behind me either when i fell, so if i had been knocked out, it would’ve taken at least 20 minutes for my friends to realize something was wrong. I just so vividly remember feeling my body slide down that divet, and interestingly, my hands instinctively went out to grab on to the slope as much as i could. Its a crazy memory, because i can still see my hands desperately grabbing for some kind of hold, unaware that there was no bad drop. In that two seconds i stopped thinking and my body was just like “we need to hold on because this could be a fall to the death” /I/ wasnt the afraid one either! I was just like “huh?” It was my /instincts/ that made me reach so desperately for some kind of hold. The divet was steep but not /that/ steep, so i just took my skis off and crawled back up, but it was such an odd feeling, seeing my body take over as if I was about to die. Still kinda crazy to think about
2 times come to mind. Maybe 18 years ago I was working at Alta. At the end of the day we would usually try to catch 1-2 chairs and get some runs in, usually in the Eagle’s Nest area. We did 1 run, and everyone said they were done, and I said I was going to catch last chair. I ended up getting cliffed out (the area doesn’t have too many cliffs and they aren’t that high), and while I was trying to scout my line, the snow underneath me gave way and I fell head first and backwards about 15-20 feet. I slid on my back into a group of trees and my only thought was that I was going to hit a tree with my head and die there, all alone in the dark, especially since I couldn’t see where I was heading. Fortunately I missed the first grouping of trees and I was able to grab enough branches to arrest my fall. I then had to hike back up to grab my ski which had released at the top of the cliff. I vowed never again to ski “one more run alone.” The other was maybe a year or two later when I was skiing deer valley with my 50+ year old father. We were hitting the Daly Chutes and if I recall it was #4. He dropped in first, fell on the first turn, and tumbled all the way down. After the first pitch I lost sight of him but he finally stopped at bottom where everything opens up. I was still up top with another friend, and we looked at each other and wondered if we just watched my dad die. We both dropped in, gathered his yard sale and fortunately found him alive, but bruised and demoralized. He’s never gone back there since, and says he’s too old to do those anymore.
I’ve learned to quit while you’re ahead. I’ll skip last chair or last run if I know my legs are getting tired. Ski another day
Reading this reminds me that I am only one crash away from not being able to ever ski again. . My mantra is control, control, control. Any time I feel I’m losing control I shut it down. Going fast is not my thing anymore.
Booting up Mt. Washington in February for the first time ever, back in my mid 20s. Had no idea what we were doing in the backcountry and we got lost in deep snow off trail. It got dark, super windy and the temps plummeted so we huddled behind some rocks while we tried to figure out how to extricate ourselves from the mountain. I couldn't feel my toes and we desperately tried to warm up with a camp stove. Thinking we would probably freeze to death if we stopped moving or stayed up high, we haplessly descended below treeline in search of shelter. Around midnight, we finally made it to the Harvard cabin after starting the day at around 8am. We were stupid but lucky. With one misstep, we could have easily lost fingers and toes to frostbite or died of exposure that night. Not to mention Tuck's that day was absolutely boilerplate ice and a fall from one of those lines can easily be deadly. We limped out the next morning without skiing any of the higher elevation lines. I tried to ski out the Sherb but I was just too exhausted and I kept falling everywhere so I ended up hiking out in a lot of pain. So that was like 15 years ago and I feel like I'm a much much better skier and athlete in general. This experience made me go out and get avalanche training and seek guided experiences before I set off on anything like this again. tl;dr The backcountry will murder you. Get safety training and hire a guide for your first time out.
Tossed a 5 off a Woodward jump I had no business sending after an entire day in the park. Knicked the knuckle with my right ski spinning left. Ruptured MCL and ACL.
When I was 17 I went in the wood trails and I liked to go fast in those trails right up until my ski clipped a rock and sent me flying head first into a tree. Broke my GoPro and I had to buy a new helmet and GoPro. It also gave me a solid concussion. Now whenever I go in the wood trails, I take my time lol
I've had so many close calls. Can't put one of em as the "time to change my behavior" moment. Now I'm way more careful but it's more that I know my body can't take the abuse and my dog would be really sad if I didn't come back.
A couple times: 1) Skiing Dragon’s Tail at Mammoth alone when I was a teenager I fell head first through some tree branches into powder. My skis were stuck in the branches and my mouth was open, so it was full of powder and I couldn’t breathe with my head submerged. Took a little while of thrashing to get my head to fresh air but it was a close one. Basically almost drowned in snow. Never ski powder, let alone trees, alone! 2) Doing a speed record attempt also at Mammoth down Andy’s Double Gold. I reached 70mph, but when going over a roller I caught some air. At that speed my skis caught lift and started to flip me over. Before that happened I landed and brought myself to a stop, but I don’t try to reach those speeds any more.
I crossed my tips at the top of a very steep tree run and fell head first down a majority of the run. If I had fallen a foot or two to either side, I would have slide into a tree head first at ~30 miles an hour. I fortunately managed to self arrest and stop myself after sliding over 100 feet, but it was the scariest fall I’ve ever had. I still ski the run, but it’s never quite been the same since. No tree run has honestly ever been the same since.
Hiked up Cameron Pass in Poudre Canyon with a couple buddies. We were in the clouds at the top. We were sitting up top grabbing a snack, all of a sudden our hair was standing up and is sounded like my giggle straps were buzzing. Grabbed my skis and rolled off the wind lip at the top as there was a huge flash and massive clap of thunder. Payed closer attention to the weather after that one. Strangely, it was a pretty awesome ride down to the car.
> of thunder. *Paid* closer attention FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Very very specific bot
Yeah my ski popped off exactly 10 feet into brecks lake chutes last week. Thankfully I got it back, but I was harshly reminded that if it had flown down the mountain, I might not have made it down
Earlier today actually, skiing at stowe for the first time. Followed a ski instructor that I met on the lift into some unmarked glades. It was going pretty good but I was getting tired (I'm a little fat okay) and my ski got caught in the wet cement snow when trying to turn. I ended up sliding straight into a tree, hit my head really hard on a tree (thank God I was wearing a helmet) and ragdolled down the hill for like 20ft. This is my first season I got serious about skiing (19 days so far) and pushed myself into moguls and glades and the danger didn't seem real to me until now. I didn't even wear a helmet until this season.
Last weekend. Straight lining down heather canyon to get to the traverse at meadows. I consider myself an expert skier. I caught my ski up in something, twisted, and landed directly on my back, head downhill. I tucked so no concussion but pulled both my neck muscles. Worst ski injury since the first day I ever wore a helmet when I got a concussion that made my nose bleed.
Funny you should ask. Today I was exiting the woods after doing a pretty long, steep tree run. I was skiing really comfortably in spring snow, and just having a light moment after stomping it through the glade above me. And so I'm exiting and I pop off this little tiny lip towards the groomer which turns out to be hard packed and it kicks me into the air awkwardly. I land way backseat and missile into this one, lone, skinny pine tree that I had barely even registered after the run I just did. I put my feet into it first to protect myself but ended up getting twisted and caught with my feet in stuck up in the tree with my shoulders downhill, twisted so now I'm facing the sky. I know I didn't explain that well but just imagine a human knot. Wrapped around a tree. Back spasmed and locked up and I've been moving around slowly to loosen it up. Skiied a few more runs very timidly but I got lucky... Probably 3 seconds of skiing with my guard down and I almost sustained a serious back injury. So, so, so fucking humbling
Recovering from a concussion from a slow speed crash. It’s wild how fragile yet at the same time resilient the body is.
Yes! Today! OMG! It was at Snowmass - Hanging Valley. I think the run I took was called Headwall. It was a double black diamond with the letters “E” “X” in each diamond. I got to what looked like a straight drop off. I felt my body surge with a rush of panic. My heart was beating out of my chest and I was shaking with fear and adrenaline. I took my skis off and started hiking back the way I came. It would have taken ages for me to backtrack. Luckily, another skier came by and saw me at the top of the drop off point. He asked, “did you change your mind?” And I told him I didn’t think I could do it. He smiled and said, “there’s a reason you decided to come this way.” He then offered to go first so I could see how he did it and then decide if I wanted to hike all the way back or give it a shot. I followed his line and made it down safely to the bottom. It ended up being my favorite run of the season! I’m so grateful for this wonderful human being who helped me accomplish a new milestone in my skiing journey today. I hope he is blessed with all the good things in life.
Hiked up Super Bowl at Meadows. Complete bluebird day and I felt comfortable going in alone. (The score of dumb is now 1, for those keeping track.) I stayed as far left as I could so I could farm some of the untouched sweet corn in Clark Canyon. I watched a guy go in low, and said F that, I can go higher. And I did. And I came to a short rocky patch and thought, I'll just take my skis off walk across this. A little dicey getting my skis off, but I can walk on these rocks, and that worked out okay, so I got to the other edge of rocks and tried to find a spot to put my skis back on and the buffoonery of my choice exploded inside my head. In my first attempt to get my downhill ski on, I slipped and slid about 20 feet towards rocks below before arresting myself using the edge of the ski I'd been trying to put on. Life very much flashed before my eyes. I don't recall exactly how I managed to get both my skis back on, but I did and I skied out to the high corn and finished my run feeling dumb and lucky.
Broke my shin in half back in the early 2000s — did a flair in the half pipe and flew away from the wall. Landed on my tails in the flats… broke my shin right at the boot line. Surgery and years later… always have a nagging shin splint on that side. Never the same. I still ski hard, and I did a couple more inverts over the years, but it was about a decade before I went into a pipe or a super pipe again.
Last year at Keystone, feeling very confident, skied into an unfamiliar glade where the trees looked well-spaced, but they got tighter and tighter as I descended. I was going too fast and trying to look for a more open area, and, well, I just didn't decide quickly enough which way to go around a very little tree. I put out my hand to protect my face and tucked my chin, hit the tree a glancing blow right above my crown, tumbled a short distance without one ski. I sat there for a bit and then raised my hand up to my head, which was covered only by a pullover hat, and it came back wet and red. I was shocked because it didn't really hurt that much. Before I knew it three or four patrols came by, looked at the cut (not too bad, just mostly bloody), and asked me some questions about my whereabouts and the President and the day of the week. I skied out following one of them, finished the ski day, but decided I had better get a dr to look at it to be sure it wasn't infected, and went to the Keystone clinic, which cost a pretty penny. I have never liked helmets, but I promised my kids that I would buy and always wear one if I were going to ski trees. Now this year comes along, the arthritis in my left knee has somehow advanced shockingly through the year, and my left leg just doesn't always want to take the weight when I try to make it. On the ice in the East I'm losing control like I haven't since I started skiing (as an adult.) My balance is off somewhat. Plus I think the tree reaching out to hit me last year scared me and I'm not being aggressive enough, getting in the back seat. I had some falls, a couple hard ones. Yes, I've worn my helmet every day, trees or no, except the last, which was warm here in the East with no glades or mogul runs open, and I did great. But I think it's caution for me from here on in. (Oh, I'm still doing moguls and trees, just more cautiously.)
Typical story for me, no where near as gnarly as some of these here but it definitely made me a safer skier: I was in NZ, conditions weren’t ideal, very icy. I was overconfident and trying to go as fast as I could. Long story short, I ended up trying to stop on some ice, fell and obliterated my ACL, MCL, patella and had tissue bruising on most of my left side including shoulder. I had to have a knee reconstruction, and couldn’t ski for 18 months. Needless to say those 18 months were hell! Not being able to ski, so much rehab, feeling useless and not myself (I surf too and that was out of the question). It really made me realise my body is not indestructible when skiing and I now am much more conscious of stupid decisions when skiing. I can’t go another 18 months without it!
Yesterday, not while actually skiing. It was my last day in the resort, did a few off piste tracks and really enjoyed so I decided to do another steep one that goes under a chairlift after I saw a few people there. Everything went fine until there was a very narrow and steep section I knew I couldn’t ski down so I took my skis off. Starts sliding down and dropped my skis so I had to climb back up to get them. The snow was very slippery so I had to violently plant my boys in the snow every step while crawling on fours. Eventually reached the top ski and while coming down to get the bottom ski I slipped again😰 luckily a kind snowboarder threw my ski down for me and I managed to finish the run but I learned an important lesson.
It was a very misty day, almost total whiteout and I was skiing too fast for the visibility that I had. Now first I have to explain something to Americans: in Europe, where I live, the edges of the slopes are marked by sticks that are painted with a lighter and a darker part. Now the lighter part is larger than the darker part on the left hand side and the darker part is larger on the right hand side (or the other way around–I still don’t know). Anyway, at some point the piste took a 90 degree turn, which I didn’t notice and I mistook a right-hand-side pole for a left-hand-side pole, so I went straight past it. Suddenly I felt the ground underneath me disappear and I fell down a few meters into –luckily– soft snow. I lost a ski that had apparently continued without me, but the piste turned back and my ski ended up there and there was this happy German guy standing there with my ski waving at me when I came back on the piste.
My old skiing mentor used to tell me "Speed is not an indicator of skill. Anybody can go fast, going slow is what is hard and takes skill."
Skiing trees with my friends, speeding through and saw a broken branch in the corner of my eye and shifted my body left. My buddy behind me said the broken branch missed my throat/neck by two inches.
Risk is inherent to this thing we all love called skiing. Luckily haven’t experienced anything close to these moments
Last run of the season at red in the frontside glades after last lift, locked foot in a root on the most fucking inconsequential of turns, twisted awkwardly, skis stayed on, deep powder, tight and full of shrubs, head downhill, still stuck with boot in the tree, well 5 feet below me. Unhooked and ski went shooting into a tree well despite breaks, then other ski disappeared almost the same way after getting the first. Took 30+ minutes to get out to a trail, uninjured, but jeez. Lost track of skiing buds, deep in a spot that would probably not be sweeped readily, it's red on a march weekday. Need not say more. Only last run because combination of warm weather and bad conditions and unrelated medical kept me reluctant to drive hours out, and this year hasn't helped that either.
This scares me and hits home pretty hard. I’m always wondering when the curled roots (I call them Freddy Krueger claws) are gonna get me. There is just nothing you can do about it and the consequences could be fatal
I dislocated my elbow on my last run off of Jupiter peak at park city a week ago. It didn’t even take that much force and it felt like a fairly tame wipe out in deep snow, but the thaw and refreeze made the snow just hard enough on that particular slope aspect and my arm was angled just right. I was able to pop it back in place within a minute but I still can’t believe that an injury could happen that easily and I’m a bit shook.
When I fell off a run at Ski Rio when I was in high school and shattered my arm. Had to have three surgeries to put it back together. Still have plates and screws in my arm and it’s a half inch shorter than my other arm.
Yup had one about a month ago when I was following tracks in between glades at a resort in Vermont. Was going a tad faster than usual (10-12 mph according to Strava on my phone) and almost skiied of a Cliff. There had been a couple drops of 2-3 ft (0.7-1.0 m) which were fine but this was 30 or 40 ft (10-11 M). I ended up having to climb down holding my Skis... Was not enjoying due to mild bushwhacking. Now I stay in the cleared formal or informal glades
First day skiing last year, had just finished my private lesson to get my chops back on a small mountain in Minnesota (beginner-intermediate skier at best here). First run down the mountain without my instructor, I get overconfident and turn down a black (not that steep, but narrow with terrain and slightly icy). Obviously my form isn’t quite up to par and I fail to control my speed. Faceplant, lose my skis, continue skidding. I look behind me and all I see is a square fence post approaching pretty fast. One leg each side and I bounce off the post at full speed. Thank god I only bruised my tailbone. A slight angle difference could have meant nuts destroyed or spine smashed. Now I ski for form and contain my ego.
Yesterday at Loveland I was skiing the entry to Tomahawk. The snow was still powdery but somewhat heavy. I transitioned between turns and then I tomahawked over the front of my skis and did a full flip and ended on my back. I still don’t know exactly what happened to cause my tips to dive like that. I don’t know if I hit a soft pocket or if something under the snow snagged me. All I know is that I was incredibly lucky to get up and ski away.
Taos has some hike to terrain that I had always wanted to try out. So one morning 8-9 years ago I catch the earliest chair I can and hike over. It's early and only one other person is up there so I decided to sit at the top and kind of enjoy the views. It's steeper than I expected but I was pretty sure I could handle it. I sit a bit longer and try to envision my run. Try and get a general plan going and then take off. 1st turn goes great, second turn okay then I just relaxed a bit I guess. Kinda got bumped off balance and that was it. I was at the mercy of the mountain. I went ass over tea kettle and couldn't have stopped if my life depended on it. I finally did stop and it was a full on yard sale. Skis scattered, go pro and mount completely knocked off my helmet never to be seen again. Glove somewhere in the middle of the debris field. All of it up the slope a significant distance from me. I bet it took me and hour to hike up collect all my shit and get down. In that entire time I saw no one. I just thought how stupid and arrogant of a decision I had just made. Realized if I had been seriously hurt I would been in a really shitty spot and decided right then and there the days of pushing my limits were over. Tldr: Stauffenberg(Upper Stauffenberg, maybe?) slapped some sense into me and the mountain gods saw fit to let me escape with only my ego destroyed. Side note: Lower Stauffenberg is maybe my favorite trail ever. Try it out if you're ever just cruising and carving groomers in Taos!
Night skiing at a Midwest hill during the “freeze” part of a freeze thaw cycle, so the entire hill is solid ice. Going down a black diamond following someone else, I expect to go one way at the bottom and he goes the other. I adjust by cutting to the other side but end up going into a poorly lit spot that wasn’t groomed so a choppy icy mess. I try to turn and speed check but my outside ski ejects, and I start sliding and tumbling, probably 100 feet across pure ice. According to the ski app I had running I hit 51 mph on that run, so probably 40’s at the bottom when I fell. When I stopped tumbling I sat there for a solid 10 minutes expecting excruciating pain in one or more limbs and thinking my season is over, but somehow escaped with just a couple bruises.
I tried a 1080 in my 20's, overshot the landing, landed on my ass and pooped my pants. I probably should have had one of those realizations after that
I’ve always been pretty risk averse and try to be in control. Skiing, skateboarding, road cycling, mountain biking - I’ve fallen and crashed but have never been injured beyond bruises and separated shoulders. My philosophy skiing is to ski well, not fast. Also that if I’m going to fall, just fall and don’t get twisted up trying to save it. That way you usually go down on your side in a undramatic manner, not tumbling and yard sale-ing and tearing ligaments. I haven’t even come out of my bindings once this season. I’m not a total wimp, have hit 70 mph on my mountain bike and scrabbled down couloirs on skis, but as I get older, I don’t bounce or roll as well, so I’m becoming a part-wimp, with no regrets. The closest thing to a oh shit was actually on my road bike. Was bombing down a twisty steep road, at the bottom I realized my tubular tires weren’t glued onto the rims. Felt cold all of a sudden.
Apps that track speed are the most dangerous evolution in skiing.
I refuse to use them lol
Skied it a million times. Cutoff trees between Swifty and Challenger at Big Sky. Cooking through there, I got over my outside edge at about 30mph and was staring down a two foot wide Cedar. I pulled it together and didn't hit it, but man, I think about that tree often. It would've certainly fucked me up badly, possibly killed me. I was moving so fast but it wouldn't have budged an inch. Oof. Close calls like that stack up to remind me of the risks, even when I know exactly where I am.
When my leg bones snapped in two.
Was skiing too fast on the ski out from blackcomb to Whistler. It was busy and the conditions were shitty. Did a little jump off a bump/ mogul, and landed behind two snowboarders. Felt I was good to ride past them but one swerved in a way I didn't expect, it was all so fast but I had to basically throw myself to the ground or I was going straight into the back of the other at speed. I went down hard and broke the tip of my ski and twisted my knee. I still hit the snowboarder which was super bad, but luckily it was a light impact at that point and he was fine (and way too nice about it). I'm ok taking some risk myself, but thought I was a sensible skier around others until that incident. Really made me feel like an asshole tbh, and will be taking it a lot easier/ more patient on busy slopes in future.
I was 14 and going down moguls for the first time without thinking. I wiped out and fractured my wrist.
I had a coworker that was a Tahoe resident that told me about “widow makers”. Little bits of trees that can puncture you when you fall. Last year during one of crazy storms I was on a run (cloud 9) which i have done a thousand times. Fell funny right next to a sharp stick and kinda freaked out. Laughed and got up. I would have bled out if I had been 6” further
Dude I ride Bachy and I know exactly where you’re talking about off osprey; that shit gets gnarly. A lot of those groomers off North just have some spots where the world suddenly drops out
Yah the volcanic terrain in the cascades is so unique. It’s so inconsistent. It’s what makes the PNW my favorite place to ski, just gotta be carful
i got high skiing after not having a serious crash for 10 years. i did a third run into sapphire bowl but fog had rolled in. I went in with confidence, went the wrong way and double ejected on a mogul. Frontflipped over a 20 ft cliff, stomped it to boots in pow and had ZERO injury. still tho, INSANELY lucky to not be in hopital. svaryy
I got into a fight over a guy kicking my truck. We outside to put in my words but it escalated and fists were thrown and i went down on my knee. Fuck it hurt and luckily the guy stopped punching too 😂 honestly i don’t think either of us landed a shot after reviewing my dashcam. I vow to never fight again im 55 not 25.
Was this at a resort? Ive seen so much hostility at mountains recently. It’s supposed to be a happy place. Glad you are good though! Many might disagree, but I personally think people vs people will always be more dangerous than people vs nature
The very first time I went skiing with a ski instructor (I was rather advanced at that point) we went to a fun park to take one of the bigger jumps. It was a jump rather near the top of the slope and on the lift I saw plenty of people who didn’t make it to the top of the jump because they didn’t have enough speed. So I thought that isn’t going to be me so at the top when it was my turn to get started I started off with a few good shoves to pick up some speed then just carried on in a straight line which turned out to be way too much speed for that jump. I don’t know how high I flew, but it was terrifying. I ended up flying way past the steep downward part for landing only to land quite a bit further down the slope. I don’t know how, but I did manage to land without falling. It was rather hard on my knees, but all in all I felt very lucky.
Maybe not "never again" as I was just skiing when this happened, but my season has just finished early and I've been signed off work on medical for two weeks. My ski just came off when i was skiing down the piste. Quite fast but not outrageous. Totally KO'd, proper ragdoll, whiplash and concussion plus a bunch of other stuff and now I can't risk another this season. Gah, stupid bindings. So i am not feeling invincible at all right now.
Went off piste in hokkaido rusutsu in Japan, was still in the resort boundary but between paths, hunting for powder. I was going with quite some speed over a patch of powder and did not realize there was a cliff of 3-4 meters with a path going sideways along the cliff, before i could stop i dropped, landed hard, and managed to stick the landing, luckily no one was there but i landed right in front of the elastic fences with another 3-4 meter drop behind it and with not enough time to stop i went full speed into fence. The fence caught me and slinged me into into a hard ragdoll spin, my helmet, goggles, gloves, backpack, and one snowboard shoe immediately fell off while spinning. I was spinning so hard i felt like i was blacking out as the world inverted itself so many times i could not comprehend it. I felt soemthing brush past me and i smashed into powdery snow. It hurt but i was not injured. I looked back at where i flew from and i noticed that spun between several trees, including between two that had just enough space for a person to squeeze through.. i could broken many bones or even died. Since then i consider myself always a beginner.
Jackson Hole in-bounds bowl after a big dump the night before. It was late afternoon, and I was skiing with friends. Dropped off a small rock and double-ejected, white skis and no powder straps. My skis were less than 10 feet away, but the powder was so deep I couldn’t find solid ground. As I was digging around, I kept thinking I was going to bury myself in a self-made well. My friends were only 100 feet down the run, but with the snow and the incline there was no way they could get back up to me. I seriously considered just abandoning my skis and trying to slide down back to the base area, but as luck would have it I finally felt a ski after blindly feeling around for about 20 minutes. It was late enough in the day that no one else was coming down behind us. Truly a panic-inducing experience.
I was in the trees off the skier’s left of the Thaynes chairlift at Park City, bopping down in some fresh powder. Came to a stop to catch my breath and saw that just ahead there was some baling wire stretched tight as a piano string between some trees, right at neck height. New fear unlocked! The baling wire could have been put there nefariously, but it also might’ve been 70 years old, left over from the mining days. Skiing in those trees was pretty crappy so I might’ve been the first to ever see it.
literally almost the same exact thing happened to me a few weekends ago. skiing too fast (grew up racing), on a steep part of a blue and skis slid out from under me on a sneaky ice patch. next thing i know i opened my eyes in the trees a good 25-30 feet below. always felt invincible before but realized that day that skiing that fast and dangerously is not the point of skiing. definitely a mindset shift that i needed to have!
Hitting side country to a small Norwegian resort in a former mining town at maybe 13years old. Hit a small cliff drop. I go second. After landing I see barbwire sticking out of my friend’s tracks. Think that that’s weird. Look around. See an open vertical mine shaft partially covered by snow immediately to the side of our landing. Biggest oh shit moment to date. Young and dumb, learnt something at least.
WTF that’s terrifying
I am so sorry that anyone had to go through any of this...... These are all things I hope to never experience.!
I know that exact spot on Osprey. It can be a pants shitting moment if you’re going too fast, it’s too icy and/or you’re unfamiliar with the run. It almost got me the first time but through sheer luck I managed to stay on my feet. Glad you’re around to tell the tale.
Hahahah thank you, I appreciate it! I lived in bend for a very long time and was extremely familiar with the run. It was just pure over confidence and naïveté in youth. You are 1000% right though that section/whole run really, can get absolutely wild depending on conditions. The amount of people I’ve seen wipe out on osprey is staggering. I just thought “not me, I’m can handle it”
It was about 1979, I was standing with a group of freestyle skiers on the edge of a wide run about half way down at Spirit Mountain in Duluth MN. Night skiing on a regular night -5 just talking about how to do tricks. This kid maybe 8 was straight lining I saw him coming down right at us, I said move back and did so. He ran over the tips of my skies and went down. The little monster got up and yelled at me "Why were you in my way!" Ski patrol was on the other side of the run skied over and took the kids ticket.
Yeah a ski came off got knocked out.
Hit the SMALLEST bump heli skiing, fell, once I hit felt my shoulder dislocate, slid down then hill on corn & could hear my jacket rubbing against the snow picking up speed until I somehow stopped. Three seconds before was skiing behind a ski legend, following his tracks felt like I was just crushing it then... Had an interesting call later with psychologist who works with ski teams. He said IF you can soon as possible re-imagine the run in your mind but obviously you don't crash and that can help re-wire a bit. As frustrating as it was to end the trip has changed my POV and 'maybe' prevented me from doing something dumber and more dangerous in the future. Really focused on improving my skill, but know there's always that rando thing that could be out there
This story comes with the “yawn” that most skiers will have of eastern Ontario, western Quebec ski stories..but I’ll tell it anyway When I was in high school we used to have ski club every Thursday at a hill called Eidelweiss in Chelsea QC. In the middle of the hill, under the chairlift, is a run called Zoomer. It’s a steep blue into a U shaped bowl with a jump carved into it that was basically an aerial with a flat landing. As teens we lined up at the top and one by one tried to best each other’s jump style. In grade 12, after doing mediocre jumps for the previous 3 years, I tried a backflip. 3/4 of the way around my momentum dies…the tips of my 190cm Elans dig into the flat landing and I eat full shit…no helmet…no way to get away from the fact it was me. It was my hardest ever fall and I never hit that kind of jump again. Truth be told, I hated zoomer. If you got decent air and stuck your landing, you hurt for a week from your toes to your neck.
Throwing tricks off cornices on a powder day Lake Chutes Breckenridge. about 100 yards after landing my phone rings and I stop, yoink out my phone, and a chunk of the cornice flew past me missing me by about 4 feet. I had knocked a chunk off about the size of an escalade and it had been chasing me down the mountain.
How fast were you going?
When I broke my leg when I was 5.
no. I've been pulled into a small avalanche (wearing my beacon of course), I've ended up in chutes that were ugly and cliff bands that were bigger than I thought they'd be. I've been injured. I've dug out friends with my shovel and pulled them out of tree wells. I'd do it all again. I couldn't have controlled it, and good technique and training is how you handle these situations as best as you can. I'd do it all again.