Worst crash/injury you've witnessed?

Superduploman

Superduploman

Member
So what's the worst crash you've seen while skiing? And have you been the the first to arrive at the crash?

Some dos and don'ts for first aid on the mountain is accepted

Yesterday I saw a guy faceplant pretty bad on an icy stepdown, I picked up his skis and went to him when I noticed he hadn't moved for a while, then he started shaking around and doing that sound like when you suffer lung impact. Had to hold his head still until ski patrol arrived like 10 minutes later..
 
A snowboarder went off a jump and hit the landing short and did a front flip after hitting the ground and it looked like he broke his back. I went down to see if he was alright but he wasn't responding so ski patrol came and grabbed him.
 
I had to call my friend and ask somebody to go get help, took more than 10 minutes for ski patrol to get there (btw the hill is maybe 600ft with a 2minute chairlift), and the first thing ski patrol said down at the lift was "what do you need that for?"
 
Im gonna be honest I hate ski patrol. Some of the guys are really nice and friendly like I've had an actual in depth conversation with some before on various things. But when it comes to people with injuries at certain mountains I've been to, they're always miserable middle aged men who hate their jobs.
 
Someone didnt commit to a big jump, i was standing on the side of the deck waiting for them to go, they landed on me and broke their back.
 
Everyone I work with loves it, even on powder days it's such a rush helping people it's easily worth the missed skiing time
 
A guy tucked at the top of the hill. He did not slow down ever. Then came the kicker. Looked like he would land to the gucci plateau of the landing of the next kicker. But then he came down. He broke stuff. From what I heard, plenty of stuff. Never go full retard.
 
on the big jump last year at northstar, watched a couple snowboard buddies (obvious gapers) talking a buddy into hitting the jump and that you just need to go fast and everything will be great. keep in mind this was the same jump Chas Guldemond landed his first triple on but it had been mellowed down a bit on the lip. so still pretty good size...

anyway I saw this from the lift, gaper boarder rocking a massive gap between the helmet and goggles was basically straightlining from the recommended drop in spot and was all hunched over hands out like he was gonna try and guard LeBron James. hits the lip and absorbs everything with his legs but he's hauling ass and immediately the board goes straight out in front and he's basically flying through the air like he's floating in water with a wakeboard on.

ends up overshooting the sweet spot by like 15-20 feet on this huge landing and takes it straight to his back. basically like 80-90ft to almost flat. he hunkered up upon impact into like a fetal lookin sorta position and was out cold. three laps later and ski patrol was still tending to him. another two laps and the heli was there to life-flight him out of there. probably smashed several bones but watching him hit that hard from the lift almost knocked the wind out of me. They closed the jump for the rest of the day.
 
On the side of a run was a set of aerials jumps that were roped off, some person went under the rope and took the right-most aerials jump with a fair bit of speed (it was the least vert one) and their feet got kicked high in the air and they landed on their back. Carried out by a few people about 10 minutes later.

Gaper's reality check.

tumblr_leod6qMyhv1qdezf9o1_400.gif


I've probably seen worse but that was one of the more retarded things I've ever seen.
 
Steep groomer into cat track. Guy with very little control blasts off the cat track into the trees 15 ft up off the ground. Massive impact and DOA. Helmet just held all the pieces in for the doctors. Watching people die sucks. That shit stuck with me for awhile .
 
Like I said, the places I've been. You're lucky to work with people who love their job.
 
guy over shot the landing of a 40-50 footer a couple years back at vail out cold ski patrol took him down. i met him 2 years later and he said he had broke his back pelvis and factured his skull
 
hit a small 15 foot jump with WAY too much speed, did a 180 and went about 35 ft to flat (i had just started park skiing at the time) caught my edge and went straight to head smash off the ice/snow. broke my helmet in half. literally spilt it.
 
Back when I used to race, we were training super G on Bear mtn at Killington, and a guy was decapitated by a rope that was set up closing the trail we were on. Unfortunately he was going too fast for his own good and couldn't stop/didnt see the signs/rope. Our coaches made sure we didn't see the aftermath, but there was definitely a lot of blood on the trail for a few days. Eerie.
 
A few years ago we were going through Bwana Park. They had a spine/hitching post feature set up, and a gaper hit it way to fast. He took it way past the gucci plateau. We saw it from the front, and when we went around to the other side the guy was out cold and twitching. We called patrol and heard later that they flight for lifed him. Never heard whether he made it or not, but he was definitely in really bad shaped.
 
Many years ago someone was decapitated at Mt Buller after they hit a tree and their head got caught in the branches and the body kept skiing. Another person got permanent brain damage after a ski fell from a chairlift and hit them.

I didn't witness these, so I suppose it doesn't count but I'm sure there could be a thread "worst crash you didn't witness" and they'd be some real gnarly stuff to come out (so long as it wasn't made up.)
 
I saw a snowboarder overshoot a relatively small jump. He landed on his shoulder and just laid there screaming. He was in complete shock and kept saying "take off my jacket" even after we took off his jacket. Ski patrol came by. They cut his shirt to examine a bulge in his shoulder, and he had an advanced compound fracture and his bone was sticking out of his shoulder. Life flight came and picked him up shortly after.
 
I flew into a snowboarder last year and broke his shoulder. Saw somebody last weekend break their leg like a toothpick on a rodeo 7.
 
Session 1 at Windells this summer. I watched a kid overshoot their big jump (around 80 ft?) to flat. He landed on his feet but double ejected and faceplanted. It looked like he was having a seizure and I think he was coughing up blood. There was a small crater where he landed and the diggers had to shovel out all of the bloody snow. It was one of the scariest things I've ever seen but thankfully he had surprisingly minor injuries from it (broken ankle and nose, severe concussion) compared to what could've happened.
 
There was a race going on and i was watching from the lift and there was a kid walking uo the course as a racer was absoultly screaming down.the racer crashed into a gait and wiped out but still had his skis on and was heading off the trail and unfourtunatly this kid was in his sights. He clipped the kid at the knees and sent him flying and the racer ended up in the woods
 
at the medium jumpline at northstar last year I watched from the chairlift as my friend hit the second jump and... fell short, landed on his ass, and broke his tailbone. He had to sit on one of those donut things for a couple weeks.
 
I was skiing behind some guy who I could tell had never been on a mountain before. He didn't know how to turn so he started truckin' and ended up spinning around to switch and flying over a rock into the woods going like 30. Scary af.
 
a snowboarder was charging "pow" at a-basin. but it was spring pow, so there was no shortage of ice crust this fresh snow. he lost control, caught an edge, and landed on an outcrop of rocks back first.
 
Kid fell off the chairlift at the tallest tower and landed on his arm. Talked to the guys patrolling a couple days later and they said his arm felt like jello....
 
Chillen on the chairlift when all of the sudden, I spot one of those 8 year olds going like 40 that never have control and yet manage to never fall. Well anyway lets just say this one wasn't so lucky. He was fuckin flyin and slammed right into a snowmachine...
 
I was waiting in the lift line and a guy fell off the lift at one of its highest points (maybe 70 ft). The patrolers were around him for about 2 hours. I know he broke both his legs and there is a rumor going around that hes a vegetable. saaad story

In the warm ups for a comp a boarder somehow got way forward and caught his toe and nailed his head. He got seizures on the hill and again rumors that he had to get the paddles at the E.R.
 
My friend nutted himself on the top of a wallride (actually bruised his balls) it was gnarly and hilarious at the same time. (he skied away so i didn't look like an asshole for laughing)
 
I was on the chairlift and watched some little kid tomahawk about 2 times on corduroy. Little dude was so tough, he just got up and kept skiing.
 
I did a good one exploding my binding on a 10 footer on a hard packed day. Did that right in under the chairs. My friend texted me later to make sure I was ok.

A friend knocked himself out while warming up on a 360 in a comp. That was really violent.

Who was the pro that shattered his kneecap when his ski got caught on the wrong side of the pole, and whipped his knee into the end of the rail on an urban? That was fucking knarly
 
I was at summer camp and one of the freestyle kids went to backflip the mogul jump and took it to 1.5 and broke his hip or some shit. It was gnarly.
 
ive snapped my collar bone in half after over judging a jump and over rotated a 3. tore my rotator cuff on a 10foot drop. dislocated my should on a green run from falling over. ripped a ligament in my hand in half from heavy ass momentum hands after landing a jump. cracked my sternum from landing on my back. and a broken wrist from learning how to do rails back in the day. and another broken thumb from just skiing and catching it in the snow. Im a fragile guy i guess.
 
ive snapped my collar bone in half after over judging a jump and over rotated a 3. tore my rotator cuff on a 10foot drop. dislocated my should on a green run from falling over. ripped a ligament in my hand in half from heavy ass momentum hands after landing a jump. cracked my sternum from landing on my back. and a broken wrist from learning how to do rails back in the day. and another broken thumb from just skiing and catching it in the snow. Im a fragile guy i guess.
 
heard someone go into trees. sounded like a car crash from lift. saw boots sticking out of swamp! thought dude was dead! looked like when they found the kid by the tracks in the movie "stand by me". was a patroller who lost edge on icy turn at bottom. was in a coma for bout a month. scary!
 
Yesterday my bro fell on a patch of ice and someone fell right behind him and sliced his elbow open with their ski, there was so much blood, only had to get some stitches thankfully.
 
working Park staff last year, we had a feature called "the close out". Im sure you guys are familiar with what a close out is but incase you don't its a flat rail with a perpendicular rail attached at the end, making a 90 degree angle. well, our close out had no skirting on it so you could ski right under it if you wanted to. ANYWAYS, we all had the thought that if you were to not get your tips over that perpendicular rail, the results could be nasty. well, a couple days after we put it in, I got a call from a co-worker on the chairlift that witnessed a crash on the feature. I was the first to respond and what I saw will forever stick with me. A snowboard had the tip of his board slide under the rail and he took the impact straight to his Femur. when I got to the scene, he was laying face down in the landing, WITH HIS GOD DAMN FEMUR STICKING OUT OF HIS SNOWPANTS!!!!

i almost puked on the spot

but he's fine now, underwent surgery and is back to shred this season.

 
Catching both tips on doubles and knocking themselves out. OR big overshoots to hurtville. Might not be the worst but those are the worst for me watching. Makes me cringe just thinking about them.
 
I didnt witness the initial impact but i was there for the aftermath of michael schumachers crash, they were probably 10 -15 ski patrollers surrounding him and saw them loading him onto the helicopter.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top