Ever been through a lift evac?

[legalskier]

Either rescued or rescuer?
Three times that I can think of we were stopped for so long I was convinced we were going to be, but then they got auxiliary running & we made it out. Now I keep a pack of hand warmers in my pocket.

 

[Not Sure]

1980 something ,Shawnee in Pa. on a 60f day was fun actually . Patrol was very professional , wife was a bit nervous . We were given free passes so losing an hour was worth it .

edit. I like the warmer idea , never know.

 

[thetrailboss]

Yes. Christmas Day 2006 at Burke on the Willoughby Quad. I was evacced using the rope and seat set. I say that it was God's way of punishing me for skiing on Christmas Day instead of celebrating the birth of Jesus. Since then, I have never skied on Christmas Day.

I also was stuck on the Sherburne Double in 1991, but they got the auxiliary going and got us off.

 

[cdskier]

I narrowly missed having to be evac'd at SB on Heaven's Gate several years ago. If I had decided to take that lift 1 run earlier, I would have been on it when it broke down and had to be evac'd.

 

[Brewbeer]

I was evac'ed off the Red chair at Magic about 5 years ago, told to kick off the skis and drop the poles, lowered down via rope. Was about 90 minutes from the time the lift stopped until I was on the ground. One of the last chairs evac'ed.

 

[2Planker]

Either rescued or rescuer?
Three times that I can think of we were stopped for so long I was convinced we were going to be, but then they got auxiliary running & we made it out. Now I keep a pack of hand warmers in my pocket.

Spent 25 year as a Patroller... So Yeah, Been thru a few Lift Evac's. It's all about good training, good equipment, and having the right people in place. Weather is a huge variant, and doing it in the dark really sucks

 

[Cornhead]

Only once, chair 5 at Greek Peak. I was with my son who must've been about 8-10 years old, so 1997-99. I knew we were going to be evacuated when a snowmobile uphill of us was working his way down, stopping at every chair and talking to the people in it. My son was very nervous, and asked me how they were going to get us down. I told him maybe they'd have us jump onto an air bag. Really?! I said no, not really, but it would be cool. I explained they'd be lowering us down.

When our turn came around, I patted my belly at told the guys who were going to lower us that I was sorry, and I'd been meaning to drop a few pounds. They just laughed and explained that with the rope wrapped around itself, the more weight, the more it grabbed onto itself. I was a little nervous about the aluminum t-bar holding up to the strain though.

I can't remember how long it took, quite awhile, an hour maybe. Our only comp was a shuttle bus ride back to the base area. Now whenever a chair stops longer than normal, I wonder if evac two is coming. If the weather is bad, I imagine it would be no fun at all. I don't remember it being an issue for us.

Sent from my Moto E (4) Plus using AlpineZone mobile app

 

[djd66]

I narrowly missed having to be evac'd at SB on Heaven's Gate several years ago. If I had decided to take that lift 1 run earlier, I would have been on it when it broke down and had to be evac'd.

I was on the Heaven’s Gate chair that day with my son. It was a bit nerve racking lifting the bar up and pushing my son off the chair from 50’ up. They also used that chair system that Trail Boss mentioned above - I was not a big fan of it. I would have felt much safer with a traditional sling.

 

[kingslug]

Hunters quad..after that they decided to fix it and move it to the west side..froze our asses off for 2 hours..they rescued over 200 people

 

[drjeff]

I got evac'd off the Ego Alley Triple at Mount Snow on MLK Day maybe 6 or 7 years ago. COLD day, with temps around zero and a stiff breeze. Took about 90 minutes from when the lift stopped (the haul rope apparently derailed off one of the sheaves on a tower near the base of the Yard Sale). I was basically over the top of Yard Sale/bottom of Ego Alley/Drop junction maybe 30 feet up in the air.

 

[andrec10]

Hunters quad..after that they decided to fix it and move it to the west side..froze our asses off for 2 hours..they rescued over 200 people

I got rescued from that too! Two other times. Windham in 1996 and Jiminy Peak in the 80's. Also used to help practice when my Dad was a Ski Patroller.

 

[Glenn]

Burke in the early 90's. Sqaul rolled though and there was lightning in the area. I'd say we were there for about 20-30 minutes before we were evac'd.

 

[skiNEwhere]

Wildcat in the late 90's on the lynx double. Waited for well over an hour before getting lowered by ski patrol. When we made it to the bottom, we saw that the haul rope literally came off of the compression sheave train. Totally worth it though seeing as me and my family got 3 free days of skiing out of it.

That lift was removed a year or two later.


Last season as Park City, I got stuck on a lift for 45 minutes before it started moving. Later that SAME DAY, I got stuck in the liftline for a chair where you had to ride the chair up to get out of the bowl.

Apparently the power company had issues, but I don't get why they didn't go to backup diesel immediately. What's kinda funny is that the broke 6 pack had one of those gates that open and close to "streamline" loading. Well they got the lift running but apparently those gates didn't have power and the liftes couldn't figure out how to manually disconnect the gates and leave them open. They had to shovel snow around the side of the lift so skiers could get by and load the chair.....eventually they figured it out

Sent from my SM-G955U using AlpineZone mobile app

 

[nkLottery]

Almost! I sat on the Barker Mountain lift as a kid for about 80 minutes once as they prepped for an evac. They got the lift running and shut it down for the day. Good thing it was warm enough outside!

 

[SkiingInABlueDream]

Speaking of Barker, how do they get ppl off the chairs that are stuck over the pond at the bottom of the lift?

 

[da-bum]

Pico in the late 90's. Was around an hour before mountain closed on a very cold day, thus very few skiers on the mountain, got on the lift with wife and roughly 50 ft later the lift stopped, we were contemplating whether we should just jump off, given we were only 10+ ft off the air, and if we drop the skis and lower ourselves by holding onto the seat of the chair or foot rest, we would probably be only 5ft from the ground. They got the lift moving in around 15 min before we got desperate enough to jump. It was mostly stop and go every few feet, so we though they would reverse the lift so we can get off given there were very few people on the lift. But instead, it went that way for roughly 1/3 of a mile, in which the lift permanently stopped with us maybe 100 ft in the air. It was getting cold and we had to do alot of exercise just to stay warm. Around the 2 hr mark, we see ski patrol climbing up the tower and realized we were going to be rescued somehow. Eventually they reached us, wrapped a harness around my chest, told me to kick off my skis and jump off the seat. The last part got me a little worried because the harness isn't pulling me up yet so I have to do the leap of faith jump. When we got down, we thought they would give us a partial refund or some other comp, but all they told us is that they got hot cocoa for us at the lodge. We though that would be a waste of time given that it was over 1 hr past closing and we were behind schedule for everything else and blew the cocoa off and went back to our inn a few miles down the road and used the jacuzzi to warm us up.

 

[ThinkSnow]

Speaking of Barker, how do they get ppl off the chairs that are stuck over the pond at the bottom of the lift?

Not familiar with Barker's pond, but other areas with ponds use a second rope to pull the evacuee over to the shoreline as they get lowered from the chair.

 

[SkiingInABlueDream]

Not familiar with Barker's pond, but other areas with ponds use a second rope to pull the evacuee over to the shoreline as they get lowered from the chair.

So essentially a zipline perpendicular to the main rope? Interesting.