Being evacuated off lifts

ForeverYung

ForeverYung

Active member
This just happened to me today, it was really windy and it knocked a tree onto the power cable for the lift. Sat there for about a hour before the got every one off. Now the lift I was on was not that high off the ground so they repelled us down, but what do they do on those lifts that are really fucking high off the ground?
 
They'll rappel you from anything upwards of 100 feet, however some crazy high lifts such as the Whistler Peak2Peak actually have separate evac ropeways where they have a platform that that travels on a secondary system and stops next to each car.
 
i'm relatively sure that all massive lifts have back up generators with enough juice to do a few full rotations to get errybody off. wouldn't want it to turn into:

frozenmovieposter.jpg
 
It almost never happens but it would be hell if it did. Kinda an irrational fear but every time the lift stops I swear I can feel it start to roll back haha
 
I swear it does start to roll back and you never know when something like that's going to happen. It could happen at any moment.....
 
hahahhhhahahaahahhhahahahahahhahahahahha

lolling for two reasons

one because its true, then i realize his statement is also a claim

the plot thickens
 
A few weeks ago at bachelor we got 15 feet away from the drop off house at the top of the summit lift and the lift stopped.

Then it started to move in reverse slowly. Me and a random snowboarder had the exact same reaction hahahaha- Look terrified, grab the railing and look down for a spot to jump.

The gaper father son combo in the middle were blissfully unaware of our impending doom...or so we thought.

The lift starting moving forward again, and next lap i noticed a yellow sign on the lift saying "this lift may move backwards".

Moral of the story: not all lifts will kill you if they move backwards.
 
I am really glad that you posted this. Because if this ever happened to me I would have immediately jumped straight off that lift to flat
 
most chairs do. Considering the weight of all the people, the play in the cable, and the play in the wheel (on some lifts dont totally lock to allow for the cable to come to rest a bit more peacefully when stopping suddenly) it's pretty common
 
A lot of lifts will roll back up a couple feet. Especially when heavily loaded lifts.

2 years ago on Deep temerity on Highlands in Aspen had a brake issue and rolled back about a 100 ft before the back up brake kicked in.

Rolling back about 50ft on a lift is when I would start considering my landing.
 
In BC if the haul rope moves back more than 60cm (might be 30cm actually) the anti roll back brake automatically engages stopping the chairs from moving back any further
 


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Not that rare of a thing? I remember reading somewhere that it took 3+ hours to get some of these people down. One of the chair riders was the wife of a LA County Fire Captain, he and his friends ended up getting her down hours before other people.
 
I remember being told as a kid if the lift starts rolling backwards picking up speed to jump off or you'll die.
 
This. Since ive seen this crazy rollback video i always think about how fast i would jump off the lift but now i'd think twice if it happened
 
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