Unusual skiing incidents

[Not Sure]

1970 Something, Junior high ski trip "Riding up chair notice a huge mogul field sort of triangle shapped, Don't remember the trail.
A guy with a hat 3' long appears at the top , terrified look and a snowplow stance. He slowly stars off and goes straight fall line. Looses one pole, then the other , then the hat , a glove and the other , one ski.......he's flying......then the ski , cartwheels and dissapears into a trough.
He's gone.... slowly see one hand then the other , pulls himself up and looks back at the yard sale....and slides on his back out of sight again.

 

[MadMadWorld]

I have a memory that will be forever blazened into my head......I believe it was on an 8th grade ski club trip that this happened. I was with a group of 4 or 5 people that skied together on a weekly at Wachusett when this all went down. As we were getting off the chairlift we saw a big crowd of people standing around. As nosey 12 year old boys of course we wanted to see what was going on. There was a guy (18 or 19) out of his mind on drugs, alcohol or both that was stomping around trying to pick a fight with anyone. People began to scatter as the guy got more and more aggressive. As this was going on my friend said "someone should get the ski patrol". Apparently he said it a little too loudly because the guy heard it. He walked over to another friend and scream at him and asked if he was the one that said. He said no but pointed to my friend. The guy walked over and without saying a word punched him out of his bindings.....literally. One of the scariest moments of my young life.

 

[St. Jerry]

$130+ lift ticket (or whatever it was at that time) should get you that kind of service

 

[Mapnut]

I had to re-read that to picture it correctly. Until then I was thinking this story is too intense for this thread!

 

[Smellytele]

Skiing Avalanche at Cannon on a icy day with my then brother-in-law. He is maybe a third to half way down - I am already below him. He falls loses one ski and he proceeds to slide to the bottom. He decides he will climb back up. I sit and wait. He gets to about 10 feet to his ski and he slips and once again slides all the way to the bottom. He at that point yells "I am done" and walks to the tram building. I rode back up the zoomer chair and got his ski and met him at the tram.

 

[MadMadWorld]

Oh yea and the time I was skiing Smuggs with my brother and ended up hanging upside down in a tree. I don't even remember exactly how it happened but I was skiing over a knoll in the trees and must have not see the branch that was sticking out. Somehow my boot/ski got jammed in between the branches and was wedged deep enough for it not to break when gravity kicked in. My newly surgically repaired knee was torqued really bad and was preventing me from moving my body at all to free myself. My brother heard my yelling and when he saw me he thought I had a compound fracture. If I wasn't yelling in pain he probably would have stopped first to take a picture. Anyways, once he was able to free me the pain in my knee was gone but my pride was scared for life.

 

[jimk]

I'm an old dude with a lot of stories. Apologize in advance for the long ramble down memory lane. Funny how many of my memorable incidents involve vehicular travel to ski areas?

In 1976 I took a college spring-break road trip to Colorado - solo. This was my first trip to ski the west, awesome revelation for a mid-Atlantic skier. Slept in my 1969 VW Bug 4 out of 9 nights. I don't think I paid more than $15 for a motel room whole trip. One of my first stops was Vail. Halfway up the mountain the chairlift crested a ridge to a view of Mid-Vail, a large, open area. There was a lodge there surrounded by outdoor BBQ grills and maybe 15,000 people partying in the March sunshine at 9,500 feet. I was 22 and said to myself, "wow, this is the big-time!"

-37 air temps in Rutland, VT on the morning of a ski day heading to Killington in Feb 1979. I was young and dumb enough to ski all day, but did buy a facemask. Fairly routine winter morning for you New Englanders, but unprecedented cold for those of us from Virginia.

Another time in the '80s I drove an old Civic from Virginia to the Catskills with two friends looking for a motel room we had reserved near Windham, never been to the Catskills before and a heavy snow squall made finding the motel challenging. Adding to my adrenalin level during the search was a flashing 'check engine' light and gas gauge reading empty on the old beater. It was 1am, but we found the place - pre GPS era.

A few years later at the end of a 900 mile driving day I was crossing Vail pass with same two ski buddies. Near the highest elevation (~11,000 feet) we went into a total whiteout. Couldn't see the tail lights of car 10 feet in front of us or the others all around until they got within inches. For several miles we creeped at 5 miles per hour in old Plymouth Horizon with regular tires. Did my best to keep track of the roadway by constantly driving on/off the shoulder. The motel clerk in Glenwood Springs dissed us and said (somewhat truthfully), "it's like that all the time."

I stayed at the T-Lazy-7 Ranch near Aspen on that trip in 1991 with rustic, but drafty, leaky cabins. While there in Aspen it snowed 30" in 30 hours. We went out and hit that snow like the once in a lifetime opportunity it was for us. It wasn't exactly blower pow and I had more wipeouts in a couple days than I usually had in a couple seasons. The second day was colder and the snow actually got lighter and better.

My number two child (daughter M) always had spunk and was doing the power pizza down black diamond runs at a young age. In the early '90s when she was 5 we skied with my sister and husband. They were decent, but casual once-every-couple-of-years skiers. I asked them if they wanted to try a black diamond. They asked, "how hard?" No problem I said. Little M's going with us. They knew she only plowed. When we got to the black diamond little M flew down in her power pizza, while they floundered and got furious with me. Afterwards they stormed into the bar for a stiff drink. Took me a couple of years to get back in their good graces.

I think it was a 2001 trip to Killington when all four of my children were, for the first time, capable enough to join my wife and I on skis. My youngest was 5 at the time and limited to beginner trails, but my older 3 went all over with me on the blue trails of that sprawling layout. I hope it doesn't reveal too much about my flawed parental instincts, but I never enjoyed their company more. I'll also cherish the last few years my late dad went skiing with my kids and I before arthritis finally caused Grandpa to hang up his skis in 1995 at age 75.

On a day-trip with my four children to Bryce Mtn, VA not so many years ago I somehow found myself alone on a chairlift at mid-day. It was a real snowy day and at the strike of noon the bells from a slopeside chapel chimed a nice rendition of the 19th century folk song Oh Shenandoah. It was January 2007 at the time of my Mom’s birthday, her first birthday since passing after a long battle with Alzheimer’s Disease. She loved that kind of music right up to the end and took me skiing at Bryce many times when I was a boy in the '60s. It wasn’t the heavily falling snow that caused my eyes to well-up on that chairlift ride.

 

[Not Sure]

I had to re-read that to picture it correctly. Until then I was thinking this story is too intense for this thread!

I guess I could have described it better , was on my butt , and My gaiter covered my foot. When I first looked I though I broke my leg , but the lack of pain was a good clue, All my buddies had broken their Scott boots by then. The first type had a lower that had several pices glued together. next generation was a one pice lower .I ended up buying a pair of Dale boots , really liked them untill a Cold Smuggs trip.
Wich is a good segway to my next story>

 

[Not Sure]

Smuggs long time ago. Girl I'm dating invites me to a Ski Club trip to Smuggs......I'm Like Yeahhhh. Well a couple of weeks before the trip things cool off between us...I'm out deposit money, I decide to go anyway. Turns out to be one of the coldest weekends . We had 12 people in our Condo, bunch of cool guys to hang with, a couple other girls, Snow as great. Girls decide to start a practical joke war. tossed some snow on two of the Guys while sleeping. A day goes by and the Guys cook up a scheme. Fill a bucket with water and snow. One guy opens the door , the other pulls down the cover and dumps 5 gallons of icewater on her. I snapped the picture as she sat up screaming.
I think the high for the weekend was 0. My plastic buckels cracked and I ended up replacing them with metal.

 

[steamboat1]

Bet non of you guys will admit to trippin while skiing.

My Bro & me at Smuggs many moons ago.

It was an interesting day to say the least & even a more interesting weekend.

Fog played a major role.

We saw a lot of things......I think.

 

[Smellytele]

Bet non of you guys will admit to trippin while skiing.

My Bro & me at Smuggs many moons ago.

It was an interesting day to say the least & even a more interesting weekend.

Fog played a major role.

We saw a lot of things......I think.

Just shrooms at Sugarbush many years ago

 

[Puck it]

One year at band camp ........

 

[skiNEwhere]

There was a video I found on YouTube a few months ago where a skier put the rope on the transfer tow at alta IN BETWEEN their legs, and they got picked up by their crotch when the tow passed over the towers. Too funny too watch.

It looks like the video got taken down since

 

[ScottySkis]

Skiing and getting lost atKillington on Friday after Thanks Giving toook 4 hours to walk to the road were taxi was walaiting. it snowed all day and that was 2001 made it home with my friend in car i always rekember that day

 

[MadMadWorld]

Thanks for the advice, y'all. I love Maine too. There are so many places to go, north and south of me. The end of Aug. I am spending a week in Maine. I would like to stop in the Whites for a couple of days, even if just to get familiar with the area. I'm not interested in peakbagging, I just want to get away from crowds and still have a good hike with good views and a quiet campsite.

You went off the back side?

 

[Quietman]

There was a video I found on YouTube a few months ago where a skier put the rope on the transfer tow at alta IN BETWEEN their legs, and they got picked up by their crotch when the tow passed over the towers. Too funny too watch.

It looks like the video got taken down since

Nope, its still on Youtube HERE Over 500,000 views.

 

[skiNEwhere]

Yes! Thank you for finding that! The link I found got taken down but looks like there were others put up. Whenever I am having a bad day I can just watch that and remember at least I didn't get lifted off the ground by my crotch

 

[boston_e]

Speaking of the Wildcat gondi...I wonder how many "bad" things happened in one of those cars?

 

[steamboat1]

Speaking of the Wildcat gondi...I wonder how many "bad" things happened in one of those cars?

Which reminds me.

Never mind.

It was very good not bad.

 

[Highway Star]

- Skiing the tram at Cannon on a weekday afternoon, got off the red car, made it to the bottom in time to load the yellow car, before they moved.

- Seeing 5 people successfully load the superstar quad at Killington.

- Seeing two consecutive top to bottom slides of Lower Ovation, while trying help someone stuck on the glare ice.