Stupidity on snow

[bjvircks]

Yesterday I almost ran down what has got to be about the stupidest thing ever!

A 20 something gal on a softie setup falls getting off the lift. No big deal. I went left, my wife went right. We didn't think anything of it. But then she continues to just sit there, doesn't show any signs of getting up or out of the way. She just sits there, happy as a clam... talking on her cellphone!!!

If I didn't need to keep the slow glide I had... I would have gone back to her, grabbed her phone and thrown it HARD against the side of the lift shack.

What the heck are people thinking these days! It seems obvious to me that nobody is getting any feedback about how thoughtless their behaviors are. When I took my kids out I spent time pointing out to them things like stopping at trailside, paying attention to liftline manners, not clogging up pinch points. Now... since resorts don't want to alienate any paying customers... staff better not tell anybody off when they are just downright stupid.

[Shred Gruumer]

That stuff burns me.. Same exact thing goes for Golf!!! which is why I only go at certain times..

Never fricken park your golf cart in front of the Hole...!!!!

Don't score your card on the green...

Take your second shot quick,,Or I;ll hit into you...

When its crowded.. don't take your first time girl friend and no do overs on the tee box..

Ohhh I could go on...

just that got me wound up.. and golf season is over...

Right said Shred

[Neil Gendzwill]

Where's the liftie? Someone should be coming out of the shack to give her a hand and a reminder.

[Phil]

About five years ago, I was working on the mt. and I came carving down a trail to see two kids (18 yo?), about 15 feet apart, laying sprawled out in the middle of the slope - not moving at all. Of course, my first thought was "oh $#!+, they are not moving at all, this collision must have been bad" I signaled a co-worker to come with me and we stopped next to them. Once we were there, the one kid's eyes were closed and I thought he might be unconscious. Then I noticed that the other kid was on his phone (I assumed he may be calling for help). I asked if he was alright. He said "yes" and went back to his convo. I asked if he needed help. By this time, the other kid had opened his eyes. The kid on the phone was like "We're fine. Would you mind? I am on the phone." I then realized that he just thought that this was a good place to sprawl out, lay in the middle of the slope and make a phone call. I asked the other guy - "OK, so what are you doing?" The reply? "I'm just waiting for him." Of course, I asked as politely as I could "Would you guys mind moving to the side of the slope until you are ready to move again, and DON'T lay down - nobody can see you from above."

[John E]

"Cell phone etiquette" is an oxymoron.

It seems like so many on their phones are thinking of no one else but themselves and whomever is on the other end.

If I were behind you on the lift & seen you smash her phone I would have cheered wildly. Somehow they need to get the message that its not all about them.

[scrapster]

Last year I saw another rider (on a Tanker, no less!) fall getting off the lift. He was only half-way down the ramp--and decided to just buckle in right there

Just yesterday I came off a lift at Okemo and, no exaggeration, there were about 15 riders dead ahead, sitting in the snow, buckling in. In the middle of them all was an orange cone with a sign on it reading "please move quickly from the unloading area." I wish I had my camera.

[AMK]

Saturday at Okemo, it was all day like that. I just give up. To many people to deal with.

[live_love_ride]

"Cell phone etiquette" is an oxymoron

Brilliant! This really should be a bumper sticker!!!

Cell phones serve a purpose but were NOT meant to be a flipping appendage!

God forbid people disconnect for a few hours. sheez

[Seraph]

Where's the liftie? Someone should be coming out of the shack to give her a hand and a reminder.

Because cell phone use, and Ipod use is DISCOURAGED, not FORBIDDEN!

:AR15firin:angryfire:angryfire

Just waiting for Bobdea to weigh in.

[jburrill]

Its better not to bring it with you. Its proven that cell phones can affect/effect your balance negatively. Something about energy fields and magnetitudes ect.

[inkaholic]

cell phones can affect/effect your balance negatively. Something about energy fields and magnetitudes ect.

Could be why this person fell getting off the lift.

Ink

[BlueB]

Where's the liftie?

At our hill procedure is simple:

People fall on the off-loading ramp and can't get out of the way quickly - liftie stops the lift.

Variations:

a) Couple of people fall on the offload, while I'm on the next chair with group of children ski students, or group of never-ever snowboard students, liftie DOESN"T stop the lift - I go and hit the liftie!

b) My group of students fell on the offload, liftie doesn't stop the lift and let next group run into us - you know it by now... ;)

[Jack M]

Didn't you know? If someone is being rude, if you call them on it, YOU are the rude one. Like, duh! ;)

[Scott]

I predict this topic will surpass the "Heard on the Slopes" and "waaaaaaay OT...." threads combined. So much material out there

Here's a small contribution- from the capital of stupid things done on the slopes - Killington

a guy dragging is snowboard up the lot to the ticket window in 6" of slush- wearing sandals with socks.

Just got me laughing

Please continue... this will be good:lurk:

[kinpa]

Ok, so yeah.... I'm in the Montana / Idaho area, but we only get cell phone service in one exact spot on the top of the hill which is after a long skate across the flats!!!! I don't think too many people know about that spot though and I'm not telling!!! hahaha.... I usually don't even bother getting the phone out of the car. Lucky me there was coverage where the car broke down a few weeks ago!

I have heard there is a spot by one of the windows in the instructors room.... haven't tried that one yet!

hahahahah

[Dan]

One day last winter, I was about 60 feet behind my wife as we got on a cat track over to a different lift (the traverse from MHEX to Shooting Star for the locals).

I see that my wife is overtaking a grom (a really small child, 5 or 6 maybe), and that a late teens/early 20s skier is overtaking my wife. (Thinks to self, "uh-oh".)

Sure enough, this dumb @$$ is incapable of looking more than 5 feet in front of him, so has to panic brake and take rapid evasive maneuvers when my wife steps over to get around the grom. He says something to my wife ...sadly, I wasn't close enough to participate in this conversation, or... :AR15firin

When I catch up with her at the top of the next pitch, I asked her what the little @#$@ had to say for himself. She said he said "Hey! You need to LOOK OUT BEHIND YOU!"

WTF? I'm continually amazed by people's ignorance of the code and their ability to say blatantly stupid **** like this with a straight face. Hey hotshot, if I could tell this was going to happen 5 seconds ago from 60 feet away, why are you so clueless?

[jonbass]

"Cell phone etiquette" is an oxymoron.

I hope you don't mind but I am going to use this as my signature. I might even make a bumper sticker.

[Hotbeans]

Wouldn't it be great if, by witness vote, dumbasses could be thrown in the octagon for a few rounds on PPV?

[boarderboy]

At our hill procedure is simple: a) Couple of people fall on the offload, while I'm on the next chair with group of children ski students, or group of never-ever snowboard students, liftie DOESN"T stop the lift - I go and hit the liftie!

b) My group of students fell on the offload, liftie doesn't stop the lift and let next group run into us - you know it by now... ;)

Remind me never to work the lifts at (Cyprus?) !!

cheers

BB

[martyagt4]

I've given up on being polite in situations like that. Not going to go out of my way to be a prick, but if you are acting ignorant, I'll let you know about it.

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

[BlueB]

Remind me never to work the lifts at (Cyprus?) !!

Ah, I was more kidding...

Truth is, lifties can prevent (and are supposed to) lot of offloading troubles. Few times they really pissed me off and I did close to hitting one, but was too busy attending to a 5 year old kid bleading from his mouth and nose :(

To understand what happened, it is important to understand by the book procedure for instructors (and lifties) when instructor comes on the quad chair with 4 small children:

Strongest/best skier kid you put on the far (inner) side of the chair and you let him take care of himself, small kid you put next and you (instructor) take care of him, the other small kid you put on the near (outside) side of the chair and liftie is supposed to take care of that one. Plus, liftie is supposed to slow down the lift on your request or by own discrettion AND to stop the lift if anything goes wrong.

So, there I was with 4 kids, sitting in propper formation, asking the guy to slow it down. Bozo left the lift at the full speed and never even attempted to help the near kid. Little one stayed on the chair, but then realised that he was supposed to get off when he was already past the offloading point and several feet in the air. He jumped and landed on his face on frozen ramp! Blood everywhere, mountain patrol on the scene, luckilly no serious injuries. Kid (well disciplined asian) expressed wish to ski down the hill, it was the last run. I was very unconfortable, having to meet the father and do the explaining. To my surprise, father just praised the kid for being brave and tapped me on the shoulder saying it was the part of learning process!

So, that liftie got to live another day, but I'm sure he had hard time later, as I had to fill the injury report.

[bobdea]

boris, no disrespect but depending on the lift if you whack a stop on a lift running at 400 or more it takes awhile for it to stop. if any rider fails to get out of the chair they screwed up and if they jump it's again their poor judgement. most lifts if you hit a stop the chair will get most of the way around the bullwheel if you had hit it where the unload line is.

also, there passenger override gate that should/would get tripped if the liftie was snoozing, at least in the US anyway.

having been on both ends of this I see two issues if you depend on a liftie for a slow when unloading it's not always gonna happen, better off to not get in the habit. 2, fast unloads usually work better because the kiddies can balance better with a little momentum.

I used to deal with a lot of this, lifties can make or break your day but you have to function when unloading as if they're not even there otherwise you're asking for trouble. people who work top shacks sometimes tend be the ones the lift ops managers don't like the public to see. don't depend on them! no matter how good the liftie is he's gonna **** up sometimes, most lifties are not that good. deal with it. BTW, I used to give the same speech to lifties about instructors, saying you can't count on them to always do what they need to do and to deal with it.

One thing I'd like to see is ski areas encouraging their lifties to be more vocal. the way some resorts run their mazes and loading areas is terrible. mammoth and a few NH ski areas are great examples. you'll watch half empty or empty chairs go by but yet there's a massive line waiting in the maze. not to mention the loading area being mess because there's no one actively doing what they need to be to get people down the ramp and into chairs.

[lowrider]

What is your reaction when an instructor dumps off his extra pupil for you to assist up and off the lift ??

[BlueB]

boris, no disrespect but depending on the lift if you whack a stop on a lift running at 400 or more it takes awhile for it to stop. if any rider fails to get out of the chair they screwed up and if they jump it's again their poor judgement. most lifts if you hit a stop the chair will get most of the way around the bullwheel if you had hit it where the unload line is.

also, there passenger override gate that should/would get tripped if the liftie was snoozing, at least in the US anyway.

having been on both ends of this I see two issues if you depend on a liftie for a slow when unloading it's not always gonna happen, better off to not get in the habit. 2, fast unloads usually work better because the kiddies can balance better with a little momentum.

I used to deal with a lot of this, lifties can make or break your day but you have to function when unloading as if they're not even there otherwise you're asking for trouble. people who work top shacks sometimes tend be the ones the lift ops managers don't like the public to see. don't depend on them! no matter how good the liftie is he's gonna **** up sometimes, most lifties are not that good. deal with it. BTW, I used to give the same speech to lifties about instructors, saying you can't count on them to always do what they need to do and to deal with it.

One thing I'd like to see is ski areas encouraging their lifties to be more vocal. the way some resorts run their mazes and loading areas is terrible. mammoth and a few NH ski areas are great examples. you'll watch half empty or empty chairs go by but yet there's a massive line waiting in the maze. not to mention the loading area being mess because there's no one actively doing what they need to be to get people down the ramp and into chairs.

Bob, I appreciate the input from lifty perspective.... but:

The procedure I described is "by the book" and we are all trained to understand it and perform it, instructors and lifties. Guy didn't even try to do anything and didn't follow my instruction, given well ahead by signal and verbal. It all happened on the begginer lift and that chair stops on the press of the button. As the matter of fact, there are two buttons, emergency "dead" stop and "soft" stop. All he had to do, even without slowing the lift, was to help the child of the chair. No excuses.

Generally, our lifties do great job and do prevent 90% of dangerous situations. Even if the lift stops a bit more then it should, it is better to be safe then sorry. We all try to live by it. Well, most of us...

[bigdyno]

I was in line the other day waiting for my pass to be scanned. There were a few people infront of me, also waiting to get scanned. (IMO this scan thing is stupid, they need the rfid system they use in europe, much more efficient) Some guy skis around the line to the scanner, gets scanned and joins the two ladies waiting for him at the load gate. I had to say something to the guy. It was a VERY slow day as there might have been 75 people on the mountain, but I told him there was a reason we were standing in line and waiting our turn. I did my best to be civil and let him know that it was unacceptable behavior, then I let him join the ladies ahead of me. He must have thought it over because at the top he came over and apologized, saying he wouldn't have appreciated someone cutting ahead of him. I hope it sticks with the guy. Also, none of the lifties said boo to the guy.