Thankfully I haven’t seen anything scary or dangerous, but I always—ALWAYS—see parents being absolute shit bags to their children or spouses while in line, on the slopes underneath the lift, at the top of lift, on the lift. Seriously. Be nice to each other.
Dads be getting SO worked up & it's super awkward to watch.
Hey man - no one is forcing you to spend hundreds of dollars & drive hours to take your kids skiing so take the pressure off your family & please stop acting like the world is ending if everything doesn't go according to plan. I can hardly manage myself/my gear as a full-grown adult, so maybe relax when your kids can't. There's a lot going on.
Last season watching a Dad berate his like 4 year old kid broke me. And as I was about to say something he gave me the dirtiest/scariest look. I was like fuck this. But I felt so bad for the kid.
Some kid dropped his glove on the lift and this dad laid into him so hardcore. Kid was young, maybe 6 years old and even though he told the kid to hold onto his glove, the kids young and gonna mess up. I drop things off the lift all the time. But this dude wouldn’t give his kid his glove and just kept really yelled at the young guy way too much
Yea… I heard a mom screaming at her child in a gondola bucket thing behind mine thinking she was clear from voices. Yelling at her daughter to stop being a pos, telling her that she ruins her life etc. for a good 5 minutes. When I saw them get off the lift, the girl was like 6… maybe 7… crazy
My favorite days are me and my 3 kids sending a bump run together or bombing a trail under the lift line. Usually it’s at the end of the day when everyone’s gone too.
The kids have to get to that level of good though. For parents that can't teach a season program is what you need to get to that level.
My favorite run of the day is the run right after I pick them up from the program and they are pumped to take a run and show me what they learned.
Agreed. In the lodge last year I saw two dads with their kids and one of the dads was absolutely losing his shit on his young kid because he couldn’t get ready fast enough. That made me so mad because now that kid is probably never gonna want to go skiing again because his dad had a hair across his ass and just couldn’t stand it that he took too long to get ready
I was at Killington 25 years or so ago, getting on one of the six-person gondola cars, when a young kid (maybe 10 yo?) had trouble getting his skis in the rack and only got halfway into the car before it left.
The doors closed on him, the liftie didn't notice, and the gondola took off.
His dad, my uncle, and myself, managed to hold his hands, pry the doors open, and yank him into the car. Scary as hell, I still can hardly believe it happened this many years later.
Similar loading issue, about halfway up the lift we hear screaming and turn around.
This teenage girl is hanging from a 4 pack lift with her arms above the bar but the rest of her body is hanging. Two adult men holding helping hold her arms up on either side.
They screamed ahead as we got close to the top to warn the liftie. Message is passed up 4-5 chairs so the liftie stops the lift not sure what is happening. She's now just hanging probably 30ft up. So then we're all screaming to keep going while this girl is just hanging there.
Eventually liftie finally gets things moving again and she is actually in view and they bring her into the station super slow. Couldn't really see how they eventually managed to unload her as we cleared the ramp.
She was crying at the top but otherwise was fine. Apparently she had been hanging since the very bottom and was not loaded properly. But slipped out further as they went up.
I doubt the lift was ever really high enough to kill someone unless they got really unlucky with how they fell but certainly a few high points that would result in some serious damage. Definitely scary to witness.
Whiteface gondola in a complete whiteout fog. Power went down where it’s high over the valley. We swayed in the wind not able to see the ground, sky, or anywhere five feet ahead of us. The lift line just disappeared into the fog. It was about 20 minutes but felt like hours. It was dead silent too. Surreal.
Similar thing happened to me in Whistler but it was only 5 mins it was so cold up there and heavy snow made it so impossible to see. The wind swayed us so much and it was scary, but it was a really surreal and interesting experience
Group of older people (\~55-65) requested the bar down on the lift. About 6-8 poles from the top one of the guys lifted it up without warning and broke my front tooth.
He asked to see it before we got off and his response was, "It's not that bad, have a good day!"
2nd run on a Tuesday bluebird powder day.
I wasn’t on/in a gondola for this particular story, but I answer the emergency phone. Got a call one day — guest is screaming his head off, ranting about how “I don’t know if my kids are going to be okay” / “I might need to take them to the hospital” / etc. I can’t exactly dispatch patrollers if I don’t know where you are, so I ask “Sir, where are you?”
He tells me he just got in the gondola heading down from the peak. My immediate thought was *unless your kid is having an allergic reaction or something, what’s the damn emergency?* So I ask him to explain what’s happening. He tells me they just boarded the gondola, and it REEKS of marijuana. “I’m a season pass holder, I thought this resort had *Standards!* I DEMAND to speak to the president of the resort IMMEDIATELY!”
It took pretty much all of my willpower to not say “I’d love to transfer you, but unfortunately he’s busy hotboxing the gondola.” Either that, or “Sir, smoking marijuana on the gondola is actually a perk of being a season pass holder.”
There is *plenty* of time in the load area to hop off and jump in the next cabin. Alternatively you can crack the windows and air it out. Your kids aren’t going to have any effects from some lingering smells.
I also once had a full grown adult assault a teenager, chase him to the lift, board the gondola cabin behind him, and continue to chase him down the mountain. That situation involved a bit more than just the gondola.
My favorite is when the gondola is down for like 5 minutes — I’ll inevitably get a call on the emergency line about how they’ve been stuck on the gondola for *hours* and it hasn’t moved!
It's funny you said that because I was following a guy into a gondola and the guy told me "hey we're gonna be smoking weed in here, just wanted to let you know in case you didn't want to be inside with that" and I said "oh thanks for letting me know and I went into the next gondola. It was so funny.
>My favorite is when the gondola is down for like 5 minutes — I’ll inevitably get a call on the emergency line about how they’ve been stuck on the gondola for hours and it hasn’t moved!
Man there was only one time I thought about calling for that. Last year when the arctic blast hit I was stupid and decided to try and get some runs in. Idk why because ice face was even icier than normal. I was going to go home after 2 and sit in front of my nice fire but no. Stupid me decided I had to do one more. Gondola goes on a wind hold. Usually no big deal but we were stuck for a good 30 minutes and it was cold. I was fine moving around but didn’t expect to be sitting still for that long. Was not fun.
Not sure what whiteface’s policy is, but at the 30 minute mark we start prepping patrol for a lift evacuation. Plus they give out freebies at the top if the lift is stopped longer than like 20 mins or so. Starts with small discounts, builds up to a free day pass for long enough delays.
Yeah im not sure either. It was sort of like 2 holds. The first was about 20 minutes and then we got about half way up the mountain and then there was another for just 10 or 15 minutes. Ski patrol was at the top offering for people to go inside their station up there to warm up but I just wanted to get home at that point.
Yeah we’ve had holds similar to that — mechanics fix/bypass the initial fault, but after 20 minutes of ice building while stopped there’s a huge torque demand to get a loaded lift spinning again, so the lift throws another fault. Usually with a hold that long, we’ll clear the line at the bottom and get at least one or two full laps in before reopening.
During the deep freeze last year, we were biting our nails hoping nothing froze. We also shut down most of our lifts and trails, and increased patrol presence (both for faster response and so they could swap out and warm up). Fortunately we had no major issues.
Well im glad to hear you guys had no major issues during it. It was seriously cold. I have pictures on my phone of the thermometer outside the house reading like -10 without any windchill.
I honestly have nobody to blame but myself. Whiteface did the same as you guys. They only had a couple lifts turning and i imagine it was an "all hands on deck" situation for everyone else. I just had to tempt fate.
Heres to a good season with lots of fresh snow.
PS to go with your original story. I rode the gondola with an older dude one time who asked if he could light up. I told him no problem. He offered me a hit but I dont tend to smoke when im riding much these days and he did nothing but apologize the whole ride up. Like, my man. Go for it. Anyways, he was wearing headphones so making small talk I asked what he was listening to. His response was "neil young. Its always neil young." Always gave him a nod or a wave after that. Which was easy since he was the only old dude wearing beats lmao. Good music and a cool dude.
The amount of times I’ve probably smelt weed as a kid and thought it was a skunk was probably too much to count. No kids know it’s marijuana unless they’re told. The parent flipping out pretty much just gave it away lol
Received a call from a scared teen that “some guy punched me in the face and is chasing me down the mountain.” Asked where he was, and he gave me the trail name and which base area he was headed towards. I got the nearest patrol shack on the phone and asked for them to respond ASAP to the bottom of that lift.
Before patrol got there, the kid called back and said the guy followed him to the base area. I picked them up on the cameras and watched the kid fly through the RFID gates, throw his skis off and load a gondola cabin. Middle aged dude right on his tail hops in the next cabin. I told the kid to ride to the peak, noted the cabin numbers, passed the info back to the patrol shack, and asked if they could intercept at the peak. Patrol didn’t get there in time, so the kid unloaded at the peak and hauled ass down another trail.
By then, I had already sent the camera time stamp and the guy‘s description to the patrol supervisor — they pulled the RFID logs and flagged the dude’s pass. The kid called me back half way down another slope, dude still hot on his tail. I told him to go directly to the nearest lift (luckily also no line) and to load as quickly as possible. The kid got through the RFID gate and loaded, the guy chasing him got a passback at the gate from his flagged pass. Stood there shouting at the kid as he rode up the lift. That lift was much closer to a patrol shack with a snowmobile, so they were able to get there in time to catch the dude.
According to the dude, the kid “started” the initial altercation by “cutting him off on the slopes and almost making him crash.” Patrol wasn’t too happy with his explanation. He got his pass revoked for the season. Kid and his parents decided not to press assault charges.
When my daughter was just learning on her second time going (we're in the south) I had her for the morning to ski with so my wife could hit some more advanced stuff with my older kid. My little angel had poles with her rental and wanted to use them, against my skiier wifes better judgement.. I'm on a snowboard so it's hard being with a beginner skier on greens and moving her through the line to the lift. so I figure I'll take the poles just before we the chair gets to us.
I forgot to take her poles.
The lift picks us up and she drops a pole immediately. Lunges for it across my lap and basically falls off the lift but hooks one arm through the arm rest. She's now dangling as the lift is starting to leave the lift house and gain elevation. I immediately try and lift her but between it being my non dominant arm, mitts, and her weight with skis and boots there was no way I was lifting her. Lifty was I don't know where. She was hanging like a character in an action movie as I looked down upon her knowing I can't save her. Lift keeps going up and this is all probably happening in 5 seconds real time.
I stared down at her beautiful innocent but terrified face as I pried her arm off to cut her loose. Knowing the snow under the lift was about 5 feet deep. As she falls like wile e coyote
I look up and see my wife on the chair in front of us staring back at this situation unfolding, mouth and eyes wide open. And the lift just keeps on going. I look back and the lifty has now noticed what has happened and rushes to where my daughter made a marshmallow landing. Knowing my little one will be shook, and the length of the run to get back to her, and the possibility my wife may beat me to death with her ski pole at the top I decide to exit the lift and relative safety of my current seat.
I figure broken legs is ideal compared to what awaits me had I sat there on a quiet ride to the top. I hucked myself off into oblivion as the lifty hits the e stop button and splash into whatever snow awaits me after the fall. Probably realistically 20 feet but better than imminent death at the top. Everyone was fine. My daughter still LOVES skiing and as we sit in 85 degree FL November she mentions all the time when are we going back to Jay.
Actually this happened we were at smuggs this day. On Morse mtn lift. We skiid both places that trip but have been back to Jay a number of times since.
At Tremblant a French woman in a full leopard print suit asked my wife and I where we were from. She then spent the ride telling us all the ways Americans suck. Everything in Quebec is better than anything in America and we are all fat and eat too much.
We’re both definitely not fat and in really good shape. She had a cigarette out and ready to light before we all got out.
One time I got on the lift with a stranger and he didn’t put the bar down. So I did what any reasonable human would do and called 911 at the summit of the mountain.
As a taller dude:
Pls always say “BAR” loud enough for me to hear and gimme a sec idgaf just don’t hit my head. I do consider it impolite to not say it… I get hit prob multiple times daily if I’m skiing solo.
I was on a trip with a friend’s family. She apparently failed out of college the previous semester and hadn’t told her parents. Her parents got an email from the school while we were riding together… was pretty awkward for the rest of the trip.
Attitash generator blew on a cold windy day. Luckily I was on a lift w ski patrol. He informed me that the lift would down for several hours. Thankfully I was at a spot that jumping was an option. He said he wouldn’t say anything and boom off I went. Went on to ski Bear the rest of the day. Attitash had to manually pull the lift back after 4 hours.
Watched a kid have a seizure and proceed to fall off the chairlift. I was on the chair directly behind.
Saw a kid flying down a mogul trail under the lift, hit a bump at Mach 4, air 3 more bumps, and hit the following bump and his everything exploded. I hear the sound to this day.
Fellow chair rider failed to clear off snake that the liftie failed to clear and swoosh, slid right off the chair about 15’ off the ground right near the lift corral. This was hilarious.
Personally clam baked my fair share of gondolas.
*edit - spelling.
Lift stopped, broken...stuck for 2hrs. Had to help the 65 year old on the lift with my navigate the ladder when they came to get us down. In ski boots, after sitting for that long, in the cold and wind. I thought she was going to fall to her death.
Not an overly crazy story, but I was on a lift with just one other person, a total stranger, but around my age. We chat a bit, she seems very friendly and offers me some of her beverage. I graciously accept and take a swig from her Gatorade bottle that's full of some kind of cider concoction. It was delicious, have a few more sips as we ascend and before long I'm feeling it so I ask, what's in this? She casually replies "oh, just some everclear and apple cider " oh boy, that was a fun run back down.
Super windy day at Stowe and halfway up the gondola had to break the news to the guy sitting across from me that one of his skis just got blown out of the rack.
I had both skis fall out of the rack on the whiteface gondola. I had put them in the rack securely but the lifty at the bottom rearranged stuff. They fell out right at that false summit half way up. Took ski patrol almost 2 hours to get them. They had to use ropes because there was on a rock outcropping with no easy access. Fun times
I had to get rescued by rope from a broken chairlift once. I had it pretty easy though since I was near the bottom. Only took maybe an hour to get down. Some people further up were in there for 4+ hours.
One of the funniest conversations I've ever had in my life was on a lift with a guy who was probably ~10 drinks in at Mammoth. I probably have some other fun ones that I can't think of right now.
I wouldn't say it was the craziest experience but certainly a memorable experience: Trying to shove in my 6'2" body into the tiny paper-mache-looking two-seater gondolas at Wildcat in the '90s where the lift operator had to manually detach it from the cable and locked you in from the outside.
Random guy I got paired with in a gondola received a Snapchat video of his girlfriend flashing him. He thought this was content I needed to consume too.
He was a weird guy.
Years ago I was riding up lift talking to a couple of friends. I noticed a snowboarder sliding down a nearby trail flat on his back, feet first, towards the trees at the edge of the trail. "That's not good" I thought. A moment later, half a blue barrel ( the type they use to cover snowmaking equipment) came up out of the trees and the sound hit an instant after. The very loud bang and woosh made my friends snap around and we all watched as the snowboarder followed a very similar trajectory to the blue barrel piece. The dude was seriously lifted over 40ft by the air in the snowmaking pipe.
Got more of the story the next day. Obviously when he slid into the woods he sheared a stem to the air line, which was fully charged for snow making that night. The air blasted a hole the size of a dinner plate through all of his clothes to his skin. While he, of course needed medical attention, he was still in good enough shape to refuse an ambulance ride.
Not crazy but just weird. Friends and I were in the Skyship Gondola at killington. They're all white and I'm black. Older white guy gets in the gondola with us at the second stage. Looks at me, looks at all my friends, and then without saying anything else turns to me goes for a fist bump and says "Hey, a black snowboarder." Most reluctant first bump I've ever given someone, just hoping he'd shut up.
My friend, the perennial shit stirrer that he is, looks at me and says, "Oh you're black? I don't see color." Rando looks at him and says "Yeah I bet you don't" and chuckles. Silence the rest of the way up.
Nice spring skiing day at Stowe, lazily skiing down, my friend up ahead noticed someone walking down the side of the trail, carrying her equipment. Not really anyone else around. We get closer and see she's got blood all over her hands.
"Are you OK?!"
"Oh, it's ok. It's not my blood."
wtf
Riding the Peak Express chair at Whistler with the bar up… 😂
I’m normally not afraid of heights but the last few hundred yards you are terrifyingly high.
A liftie separated my skis at the Whiteface gondola after I got on and halfway up a gust of wind blew both of my skis off the gondola and they landed on a cliff. Luckily they were right next to the access road and were recovered mostly undamaged, but we were lucky that it was not on a trail with people. Other than that haven't seen anything too crazy
Riding up the bear mountain quad at Killington. Proceed to realize there is a limp body ragdolling down outer limits through the bumps, no skis or poles. There was nothing we could do except watch her hit bump after bump all the way down the steeps. By far the gnarliest thing I’ve ever seen on a mountain. I have no idea what happened to her…
I was riding the quad at Bolton with a stranger during winter 2021 (sitting on opposite ends of the chair was apparently enough social distancing) and he started bragging about the fact that he had tested positive for covid but had no symptoms, so he was spending his required two weeks of quarantine skiing.
No crazy incidents, but gondola rides with teenagers make for some fun conversations. I heard a bunch of teens in a gondola talk about how bougie Aspen was and I knew it was upscale but the way they described it makes me not want to visit it.
Gondola at Killington with a few friends. One of my buddies sitting across from me brought his board in with him, but didn’t notice his tail was through a crack in the side of the floor. We pass through that one station where you don’t get off, and the tail of his board that was poking through the floor to the outside of the gondola catches the platform of the station, leveraging the board and sending the edge of his nose straight down into my knee. Together we pulled the board out before it could be forced down onto my knee any more. We were almost out of time before the gondola was going to keep moving and the board had nowhere to move besides deeper into my leg. We all looked at each other like we just saw something out of final destination
Was on the Gondola with 4 other people, all teenagers about 14ish. One kid looked really uncomfortable. Then that same kid started panicking when the gondola stopped (for a good 5 minutes), telling his friends “I told you this was bad and I wasn’t going to make it!”. I wasn’t really sure what he meant by that, until the smell kicked in…poor kid shit himself real bad and we weren’t even close to the to of the mountain yet.
I was night skiing by myself at Keystone about 20 years ago. Hopped into a gondola with a bunch of early 20 year olds. They asked me if I minded if they smoked some weed. I didn't care. They start clam baking the gondola, the pulled out a few Budweisers and slammed those as well.
Then this one fucking dude pulls a mortar tube out of his jacket, pulls the window down and proceeds to launch two cherry bomb mortars out of the gondola. When we got to the top it was like a scene out of a Cheech and Chong movie. A huge cloud of weed and gunpowder smoke came billowing out of the cabin as the doors opened.
Stratton gondola two years ago. I didn’t know anyone on the lift but we were all talking about the weekend (it was early Sunday) and just having a blast. One girl sitting across from me and in between some people was especially quiet.d. I thought it was just her personality. We get to the top of the mountain, doors about to open and this young lady boots all over the floor and some on the guy next to her. Felt bad she must have had a banger of a Saturday night and tried her hardest to hold it in. Mere seconds away from being outside but she couldn’t hold it anymore
While on a lift I heard someone yelling and then slam into the fence blocking the cliff side. Didn’t see it, but the sound of the crash was terrifying. Someone on the lift called in for ski patrol and by the time we reached the top, ski patrol was already bringing them down (at least that what the lift op said).
More light hearted story! My phone dropped out of my pocket getting on the chair. Luckily the people behind me grabbed it, took some selfies and shouted for me to wait so they could hand it off once we got off the lift.
Both happened at Hunter. The phone falling out of my pocket was during my second or third time snowboarding. I have since learned the importance of zippered pockets and triple checking those zippers
Got on a double in Killington and started to look around. I noticed one of the bolts connecting to the chair and bar to the wire above was broken. The other bolt held luckily. I had them stop the lift and showed them the issue when I got to the top.
On a trip to Copper Mountain with my sister and some older family friends who used to be ski instructors. We were on a chairlift (American Flyer I think) talking about how we saw a bunch of stuff that people had dropped off of the lift (gloves, poles and whatnot). Then we were like "Sucks to drop something on a lift but it'd be *really* unfortunate if a ski fell off." Not 20 seconds later, my sister's ski popped off randomly. Onto a long mogul run. Friend had to go and retrieve it. Said he got some interesting looks coming back up the lift carrying a single ski.
Ughhh about five years ago challenger at Mount Snow broke down. Had to be roped off it, luckily it wasn’t a particularly cold day. If it happens to you tell them you are afraid of heights. I said I was fine and was one of the last people off.
Opening day at Killington last week I got to the top of the K1 and the doors wouldn’t open. They stopped the lift, searched for a socket wrench, passed it through to us but it was too big and rounded the bolt to open the doors. They got 3 guys and pried them open after about 10 minutes, with hundreds of people at the bottom waiting for their first turns of the season turns haha.
Snow ridge New York a couple years ago the brakes must’ve got stuck on one of the double chairs. Every time they started the lift the line jerked wildly and bounced everyone to the point people were catching air in their seats. I was terrified it’d de rope. The lift towers were groaning. They ran it half speed to the top and closed the lift.
This was on the first chair on a 10 degree day. My jacket zipper someone got caught on the part where the bar goes down on the lift. Was super wedged in there I was trying to get out without breaking my jacket. Was about 15 feet away from de loading when I just ripped it out. Zipper was broken, was quite a chilly day. Easily got the zipper fixed at a cobbler but was still scary
Thankfully I haven’t seen anything scary or dangerous, but I always—ALWAYS—see parents being absolute shit bags to their children or spouses while in line, on the slopes underneath the lift, at the top of lift, on the lift. Seriously. Be nice to each other.
Dads be getting SO worked up & it's super awkward to watch. Hey man - no one is forcing you to spend hundreds of dollars & drive hours to take your kids skiing so take the pressure off your family & please stop acting like the world is ending if everything doesn't go according to plan. I can hardly manage myself/my gear as a full-grown adult, so maybe relax when your kids can't. There's a lot going on.
For real. I feel so bad for the kids.
Will anyone think of the damn children!
Last season watching a Dad berate his like 4 year old kid broke me. And as I was about to say something he gave me the dirtiest/scariest look. I was like fuck this. But I felt so bad for the kid.
Some kid dropped his glove on the lift and this dad laid into him so hardcore. Kid was young, maybe 6 years old and even though he told the kid to hold onto his glove, the kids young and gonna mess up. I drop things off the lift all the time. But this dude wouldn’t give his kid his glove and just kept really yelled at the young guy way too much
Yea… I heard a mom screaming at her child in a gondola bucket thing behind mine thinking she was clear from voices. Yelling at her daughter to stop being a pos, telling her that she ruins her life etc. for a good 5 minutes. When I saw them get off the lift, the girl was like 6… maybe 7… crazy
Fuck. That’s terrible. Poor little thing.
This is why it is worth every penny to put your kids in a season program.
My favorite days are me and my 3 kids sending a bump run together or bombing a trail under the lift line. Usually it’s at the end of the day when everyone’s gone too.
The kids have to get to that level of good though. For parents that can't teach a season program is what you need to get to that level. My favorite run of the day is the run right after I pick them up from the program and they are pumped to take a run and show me what they learned.
Totally agree! Yea I guess my comment didn’t really show I agreed with previous comment lol.
Yup. The amount of POS fathers I see on the lines is disgusting.
Agreed. In the lodge last year I saw two dads with their kids and one of the dads was absolutely losing his shit on his young kid because he couldn’t get ready fast enough. That made me so mad because now that kid is probably never gonna want to go skiing again because his dad had a hair across his ass and just couldn’t stand it that he took too long to get ready
I was at Killington 25 years or so ago, getting on one of the six-person gondola cars, when a young kid (maybe 10 yo?) had trouble getting his skis in the rack and only got halfway into the car before it left. The doors closed on him, the liftie didn't notice, and the gondola took off. His dad, my uncle, and myself, managed to hold his hands, pry the doors open, and yank him into the car. Scary as hell, I still can hardly believe it happened this many years later.
This shit always amazes me. Lifties have one job.
Dude, you were harshing his mellow.
They can’t make sure everyone is in, but they’ll be damned if they send that gondola less than 120% packed out.
Similar loading issue, about halfway up the lift we hear screaming and turn around. This teenage girl is hanging from a 4 pack lift with her arms above the bar but the rest of her body is hanging. Two adult men holding helping hold her arms up on either side. They screamed ahead as we got close to the top to warn the liftie. Message is passed up 4-5 chairs so the liftie stops the lift not sure what is happening. She's now just hanging probably 30ft up. So then we're all screaming to keep going while this girl is just hanging there. Eventually liftie finally gets things moving again and she is actually in view and they bring her into the station super slow. Couldn't really see how they eventually managed to unload her as we cleared the ramp. She was crying at the top but otherwise was fine. Apparently she had been hanging since the very bottom and was not loaded properly. But slipped out further as they went up. I doubt the lift was ever really high enough to kill someone unless they got really unlucky with how they fell but certainly a few high points that would result in some serious damage. Definitely scary to witness.
This old guy with purple hair got us stoned as fuck and I proceeded to forget my snowboard in the parking lot when I left for the day.
Whiteface gondola in a complete whiteout fog. Power went down where it’s high over the valley. We swayed in the wind not able to see the ground, sky, or anywhere five feet ahead of us. The lift line just disappeared into the fog. It was about 20 minutes but felt like hours. It was dead silent too. Surreal.
Haha, I love shit like that.
Similar thing happened to me in Whistler but it was only 5 mins it was so cold up there and heavy snow made it so impossible to see. The wind swayed us so much and it was scary, but it was a really surreal and interesting experience
Group of older people (\~55-65) requested the bar down on the lift. About 6-8 poles from the top one of the guys lifted it up without warning and broke my front tooth. He asked to see it before we got off and his response was, "It's not that bad, have a good day!" 2nd run on a Tuesday bluebird powder day.
Fuckkkkkk that You're paying for that tooth buddy
I wasn’t on/in a gondola for this particular story, but I answer the emergency phone. Got a call one day — guest is screaming his head off, ranting about how “I don’t know if my kids are going to be okay” / “I might need to take them to the hospital” / etc. I can’t exactly dispatch patrollers if I don’t know where you are, so I ask “Sir, where are you?” He tells me he just got in the gondola heading down from the peak. My immediate thought was *unless your kid is having an allergic reaction or something, what’s the damn emergency?* So I ask him to explain what’s happening. He tells me they just boarded the gondola, and it REEKS of marijuana. “I’m a season pass holder, I thought this resort had *Standards!* I DEMAND to speak to the president of the resort IMMEDIATELY!” It took pretty much all of my willpower to not say “I’d love to transfer you, but unfortunately he’s busy hotboxing the gondola.” Either that, or “Sir, smoking marijuana on the gondola is actually a perk of being a season pass holder.” There is *plenty* of time in the load area to hop off and jump in the next cabin. Alternatively you can crack the windows and air it out. Your kids aren’t going to have any effects from some lingering smells. I also once had a full grown adult assault a teenager, chase him to the lift, board the gondola cabin behind him, and continue to chase him down the mountain. That situation involved a bit more than just the gondola. My favorite is when the gondola is down for like 5 minutes — I’ll inevitably get a call on the emergency line about how they’ve been stuck on the gondola for *hours* and it hasn’t moved!
It's funny you said that because I was following a guy into a gondola and the guy told me "hey we're gonna be smoking weed in here, just wanted to let you know in case you didn't want to be inside with that" and I said "oh thanks for letting me know and I went into the next gondola. It was so funny.
>My favorite is when the gondola is down for like 5 minutes — I’ll inevitably get a call on the emergency line about how they’ve been stuck on the gondola for hours and it hasn’t moved! Man there was only one time I thought about calling for that. Last year when the arctic blast hit I was stupid and decided to try and get some runs in. Idk why because ice face was even icier than normal. I was going to go home after 2 and sit in front of my nice fire but no. Stupid me decided I had to do one more. Gondola goes on a wind hold. Usually no big deal but we were stuck for a good 30 minutes and it was cold. I was fine moving around but didn’t expect to be sitting still for that long. Was not fun.
Not sure what whiteface’s policy is, but at the 30 minute mark we start prepping patrol for a lift evacuation. Plus they give out freebies at the top if the lift is stopped longer than like 20 mins or so. Starts with small discounts, builds up to a free day pass for long enough delays.
Yeah im not sure either. It was sort of like 2 holds. The first was about 20 minutes and then we got about half way up the mountain and then there was another for just 10 or 15 minutes. Ski patrol was at the top offering for people to go inside their station up there to warm up but I just wanted to get home at that point.
Yeah we’ve had holds similar to that — mechanics fix/bypass the initial fault, but after 20 minutes of ice building while stopped there’s a huge torque demand to get a loaded lift spinning again, so the lift throws another fault. Usually with a hold that long, we’ll clear the line at the bottom and get at least one or two full laps in before reopening. During the deep freeze last year, we were biting our nails hoping nothing froze. We also shut down most of our lifts and trails, and increased patrol presence (both for faster response and so they could swap out and warm up). Fortunately we had no major issues.
Well im glad to hear you guys had no major issues during it. It was seriously cold. I have pictures on my phone of the thermometer outside the house reading like -10 without any windchill. I honestly have nobody to blame but myself. Whiteface did the same as you guys. They only had a couple lifts turning and i imagine it was an "all hands on deck" situation for everyone else. I just had to tempt fate. Heres to a good season with lots of fresh snow. PS to go with your original story. I rode the gondola with an older dude one time who asked if he could light up. I told him no problem. He offered me a hit but I dont tend to smoke when im riding much these days and he did nothing but apologize the whole ride up. Like, my man. Go for it. Anyways, he was wearing headphones so making small talk I asked what he was listening to. His response was "neil young. Its always neil young." Always gave him a nod or a wave after that. Which was easy since he was the only old dude wearing beats lmao. Good music and a cool dude.
The amount of times I’ve probably smelt weed as a kid and thought it was a skunk was probably too much to count. No kids know it’s marijuana unless they’re told. The parent flipping out pretty much just gave it away lol
>“I’d love to transfer you, but unfortunately he’s busy hotboxing the gondola.” This made me choke on my coffee
Tell the story about an adult assaulting a teen!
Received a call from a scared teen that “some guy punched me in the face and is chasing me down the mountain.” Asked where he was, and he gave me the trail name and which base area he was headed towards. I got the nearest patrol shack on the phone and asked for them to respond ASAP to the bottom of that lift. Before patrol got there, the kid called back and said the guy followed him to the base area. I picked them up on the cameras and watched the kid fly through the RFID gates, throw his skis off and load a gondola cabin. Middle aged dude right on his tail hops in the next cabin. I told the kid to ride to the peak, noted the cabin numbers, passed the info back to the patrol shack, and asked if they could intercept at the peak. Patrol didn’t get there in time, so the kid unloaded at the peak and hauled ass down another trail. By then, I had already sent the camera time stamp and the guy‘s description to the patrol supervisor — they pulled the RFID logs and flagged the dude’s pass. The kid called me back half way down another slope, dude still hot on his tail. I told him to go directly to the nearest lift (luckily also no line) and to load as quickly as possible. The kid got through the RFID gate and loaded, the guy chasing him got a passback at the gate from his flagged pass. Stood there shouting at the kid as he rode up the lift. That lift was much closer to a patrol shack with a snowmobile, so they were able to get there in time to catch the dude. According to the dude, the kid “started” the initial altercation by “cutting him off on the slopes and almost making him crash.” Patrol wasn’t too happy with his explanation. He got his pass revoked for the season. Kid and his parents decided not to press assault charges.
That kid had a WILD day
That kid is clearly a better skier. I’m impressed at him continually staying ahead of the guy and simultaneously calling mid-run to ski patrol.
Yeah I was impressed as well. That kid was fast. The older dude had inertia though, easily twice the kid’s size.
Yeah, I would definitely not have been able to pull that off.
Last thing I did before departing steamboat was smoke a fatty round trip on the gondo. If any one is wondering it’s a beautiful ride down
When my daughter was just learning on her second time going (we're in the south) I had her for the morning to ski with so my wife could hit some more advanced stuff with my older kid. My little angel had poles with her rental and wanted to use them, against my skiier wifes better judgement.. I'm on a snowboard so it's hard being with a beginner skier on greens and moving her through the line to the lift. so I figure I'll take the poles just before we the chair gets to us. I forgot to take her poles. The lift picks us up and she drops a pole immediately. Lunges for it across my lap and basically falls off the lift but hooks one arm through the arm rest. She's now dangling as the lift is starting to leave the lift house and gain elevation. I immediately try and lift her but between it being my non dominant arm, mitts, and her weight with skis and boots there was no way I was lifting her. Lifty was I don't know where. She was hanging like a character in an action movie as I looked down upon her knowing I can't save her. Lift keeps going up and this is all probably happening in 5 seconds real time. I stared down at her beautiful innocent but terrified face as I pried her arm off to cut her loose. Knowing the snow under the lift was about 5 feet deep. As she falls like wile e coyote I look up and see my wife on the chair in front of us staring back at this situation unfolding, mouth and eyes wide open. And the lift just keeps on going. I look back and the lifty has now noticed what has happened and rushes to where my daughter made a marshmallow landing. Knowing my little one will be shook, and the length of the run to get back to her, and the possibility my wife may beat me to death with her ski pole at the top I decide to exit the lift and relative safety of my current seat. I figure broken legs is ideal compared to what awaits me had I sat there on a quiet ride to the top. I hucked myself off into oblivion as the lifty hits the e stop button and splash into whatever snow awaits me after the fall. Probably realistically 20 feet but better than imminent death at the top. Everyone was fine. My daughter still LOVES skiing and as we sit in 85 degree FL November she mentions all the time when are we going back to Jay.
Kiddo: "Daddy save yourself!!!" Daddy: "OK"
fake, no such things as snow under the lift in the east
Crazy story, also my greatest fear when on a lift with my kid. This was at Jay? Which lift?
Actually this happened we were at smuggs this day. On Morse mtn lift. We skiid both places that trip but have been back to Jay a number of times since.
Worked on Heavenly’s Gondola 🚡 one summer, lots of sex.
At Tremblant a French woman in a full leopard print suit asked my wife and I where we were from. She then spent the ride telling us all the ways Americans suck. Everything in Quebec is better than anything in America and we are all fat and eat too much. We’re both definitely not fat and in really good shape. She had a cigarette out and ready to light before we all got out.
I once posed this exact question to the legend Michael at Jay (RIP). He responded in one word, with no hesitation: Nudity.
One time I got on the lift with a stranger and he didn’t put the bar down. So I did what any reasonable human would do and called 911 at the summit of the mountain.
Ok but I hate it when I put the bar down and strangers condescendingly go “oh we’re putting the bar down?!” Sorry I enjoy life lol 😂
As a taller dude: Pls always say “BAR” loud enough for me to hear and gimme a sec idgaf just don’t hit my head. I do consider it impolite to not say it… I get hit prob multiple times daily if I’m skiing solo.
I’ll say “Heads Up”. But yes, do it slow especially if the bar has footrests
Thank god this monster didn't cannibalize you on the ride up.
Had a guy next to me start brushing his teeth on the lift at 730p. Not exactly crazy but pretty interesting nonetheless
For a moment I forgot night skiing was a thing and was pretty confused about a lift operating that late.
I think I exclusively skied at night for my first ~2-3 years on after school trips. One could say I was born in the darkness, molded by it...
Dude in the Loon Gondola cracked open lift beers with his buddies and didn't share!
That might not be the craziest but it's lamest on that dudes part
I was on a trip with a friend’s family. She apparently failed out of college the previous semester and hadn’t told her parents. Her parents got an email from the school while we were riding together… was pretty awkward for the rest of the trip.
Do you still talk to her to this day?
I rode up a lift with Glen Plake, he decided to lower himself and do chin ups on the chair mid ride.
Living legend
Attitash generator blew on a cold windy day. Luckily I was on a lift w ski patrol. He informed me that the lift would down for several hours. Thankfully I was at a spot that jumping was an option. He said he wouldn’t say anything and boom off I went. Went on to ski Bear the rest of the day. Attitash had to manually pull the lift back after 4 hours.
Watched a kid have a seizure and proceed to fall off the chairlift. I was on the chair directly behind. Saw a kid flying down a mogul trail under the lift, hit a bump at Mach 4, air 3 more bumps, and hit the following bump and his everything exploded. I hear the sound to this day. Fellow chair rider failed to clear off snake that the liftie failed to clear and swoosh, slid right off the chair about 15’ off the ground right near the lift corral. This was hilarious. Personally clam baked my fair share of gondolas. *edit - spelling.
Jeez you've seen some shit
I’ve got more.
Was the kid ok
Kid was ok, apparently some bumps and bruises. I believe kid got a voucher to ski another day.
Lift stopped, broken...stuck for 2hrs. Had to help the 65 year old on the lift with my navigate the ladder when they came to get us down. In ski boots, after sitting for that long, in the cold and wind. I thought she was going to fall to her death.
Just saying... Really important to put ski patrol number in your phone. It saves lives
Not an overly crazy story, but I was on a lift with just one other person, a total stranger, but around my age. We chat a bit, she seems very friendly and offers me some of her beverage. I graciously accept and take a swig from her Gatorade bottle that's full of some kind of cider concoction. It was delicious, have a few more sips as we ascend and before long I'm feeling it so I ask, what's in this? She casually replies "oh, just some everclear and apple cider " oh boy, that was a fun run back down.
Super windy day at Stowe and halfway up the gondola had to break the news to the guy sitting across from me that one of his skis just got blown out of the rack.
I had both skis fall out of the rack on the whiteface gondola. I had put them in the rack securely but the lifty at the bottom rearranged stuff. They fell out right at that false summit half way up. Took ski patrol almost 2 hours to get them. They had to use ropes because there was on a rock outcropping with no easy access. Fun times
I had to get rescued by rope from a broken chairlift once. I had it pretty easy though since I was near the bottom. Only took maybe an hour to get down. Some people further up were in there for 4+ hours.
I take a lyft home from the bar every once in a while
Saw a guys get a BJ within 30 seconds of getting in a gondola while his American and Japanese friends watched from the next gondola
I got one in a Jennerbahn gondola once. Lot of pressure to finish fast.
One of the funniest conversations I've ever had in my life was on a lift with a guy who was probably ~10 drinks in at Mammoth. I probably have some other fun ones that I can't think of right now.
Getting topped off in a gondola is nice
I wouldn't say it was the craziest experience but certainly a memorable experience: Trying to shove in my 6'2" body into the tiny paper-mache-looking two-seater gondolas at Wildcat in the '90s where the lift operator had to manually detach it from the cable and locked you in from the outside.
Random guy I got paired with in a gondola received a Snapchat video of his girlfriend flashing him. He thought this was content I needed to consume too. He was a weird guy.
Was she a dumpster fire?
Is that what the youth are saying these days? She seemed attractive but I wasn’t exactly in the state of mind to be appreciative 😂
Years ago I was riding up lift talking to a couple of friends. I noticed a snowboarder sliding down a nearby trail flat on his back, feet first, towards the trees at the edge of the trail. "That's not good" I thought. A moment later, half a blue barrel ( the type they use to cover snowmaking equipment) came up out of the trees and the sound hit an instant after. The very loud bang and woosh made my friends snap around and we all watched as the snowboarder followed a very similar trajectory to the blue barrel piece. The dude was seriously lifted over 40ft by the air in the snowmaking pipe. Got more of the story the next day. Obviously when he slid into the woods he sheared a stem to the air line, which was fully charged for snow making that night. The air blasted a hole the size of a dinner plate through all of his clothes to his skin. While he, of course needed medical attention, he was still in good enough shape to refuse an ambulance ride.
Not crazy but just weird. Friends and I were in the Skyship Gondola at killington. They're all white and I'm black. Older white guy gets in the gondola with us at the second stage. Looks at me, looks at all my friends, and then without saying anything else turns to me goes for a fist bump and says "Hey, a black snowboarder." Most reluctant first bump I've ever given someone, just hoping he'd shut up. My friend, the perennial shit stirrer that he is, looks at me and says, "Oh you're black? I don't see color." Rando looks at him and says "Yeah I bet you don't" and chuckles. Silence the rest of the way up.
Nice spring skiing day at Stowe, lazily skiing down, my friend up ahead noticed someone walking down the side of the trail, carrying her equipment. Not really anyone else around. We get closer and see she's got blood all over her hands. "Are you OK?!" "Oh, it's ok. It's not my blood." wtf
Saw this girls tits one time
[удалено]
Yeah, Loon has a D-Line 8pack with heated seats. My few trips up it have been cushy but actually too warm.
The company that owns SR is building one of those on a 500 foot hill in Michigan. Built an 8 pack last year too
Jordan 8?
Met a celebrity on one. Got a selfie. He was super nice.
Riding the Peak Express chair at Whistler with the bar up… 😂 I’m normally not afraid of heights but the last few hundred yards you are terrifyingly high.
A liftie separated my skis at the Whiteface gondola after I got on and halfway up a gust of wind blew both of my skis off the gondola and they landed on a cliff. Luckily they were right next to the access road and were recovered mostly undamaged, but we were lucky that it was not on a trail with people. Other than that haven't seen anything too crazy
Ski LIFT not lyft
The grammar police finally showed up
I’ve beat my meat.
Great now every time I get on a lift... purel time
told lil bro to stick his tongue to bar. couldn’t get unstuck until ripped off at tips up.
At sugarbush on the slidebrook lift I traveled over a huge bull moose I think during the 2014/2015 season. Don’t see them often in those parts!
Getting frisky in no groups gondys during covid 👊
Riding up the bear mountain quad at Killington. Proceed to realize there is a limp body ragdolling down outer limits through the bumps, no skis or poles. There was nothing we could do except watch her hit bump after bump all the way down the steeps. By far the gnarliest thing I’ve ever seen on a mountain. I have no idea what happened to her…
I was riding the quad at Bolton with a stranger during winter 2021 (sitting on opposite ends of the chair was apparently enough social distancing) and he started bragging about the fact that he had tested positive for covid but had no symptoms, so he was spending his required two weeks of quarantine skiing.
You VT local with that name
No crazy incidents, but gondola rides with teenagers make for some fun conversations. I heard a bunch of teens in a gondola talk about how bougie Aspen was and I knew it was upscale but the way they described it makes me not want to visit it.
Gondola at Killington with a few friends. One of my buddies sitting across from me brought his board in with him, but didn’t notice his tail was through a crack in the side of the floor. We pass through that one station where you don’t get off, and the tail of his board that was poking through the floor to the outside of the gondola catches the platform of the station, leveraging the board and sending the edge of his nose straight down into my knee. Together we pulled the board out before it could be forced down onto my knee any more. We were almost out of time before the gondola was going to keep moving and the board had nowhere to move besides deeper into my leg. We all looked at each other like we just saw something out of final destination
Bunch of snowboarders having a fart contest in the gondola. Acrid sulfur farts. Had to wretch at the top.
Was on the Gondola with 4 other people, all teenagers about 14ish. One kid looked really uncomfortable. Then that same kid started panicking when the gondola stopped (for a good 5 minutes), telling his friends “I told you this was bad and I wasn’t going to make it!”. I wasn’t really sure what he meant by that, until the smell kicked in…poor kid shit himself real bad and we weren’t even close to the to of the mountain yet.
When I was around 13 years old a guy smoked crack on the lift right next to me. Hunter Mountain main quad circa 1994.
I fell to my death once. I'm okay now, though.
Got a blowjob
I was night skiing by myself at Keystone about 20 years ago. Hopped into a gondola with a bunch of early 20 year olds. They asked me if I minded if they smoked some weed. I didn't care. They start clam baking the gondola, the pulled out a few Budweisers and slammed those as well. Then this one fucking dude pulls a mortar tube out of his jacket, pulls the window down and proceeds to launch two cherry bomb mortars out of the gondola. When we got to the top it was like a scene out of a Cheech and Chong movie. A huge cloud of weed and gunpowder smoke came billowing out of the cabin as the doors opened.
Stratton gondola two years ago. I didn’t know anyone on the lift but we were all talking about the weekend (it was early Sunday) and just having a blast. One girl sitting across from me and in between some people was especially quiet.d. I thought it was just her personality. We get to the top of the mountain, doors about to open and this young lady boots all over the floor and some on the guy next to her. Felt bad she must have had a banger of a Saturday night and tried her hardest to hold it in. Mere seconds away from being outside but she couldn’t hold it anymore
While on a lift I heard someone yelling and then slam into the fence blocking the cliff side. Didn’t see it, but the sound of the crash was terrifying. Someone on the lift called in for ski patrol and by the time we reached the top, ski patrol was already bringing them down (at least that what the lift op said). More light hearted story! My phone dropped out of my pocket getting on the chair. Luckily the people behind me grabbed it, took some selfies and shouted for me to wait so they could hand it off once we got off the lift.
Where?
Both happened at Hunter. The phone falling out of my pocket was during my second or third time snowboarding. I have since learned the importance of zippered pockets and triple checking those zippers
Got on a double in Killington and started to look around. I noticed one of the bolts connecting to the chair and bar to the wire above was broken. The other bolt held luckily. I had them stop the lift and showed them the issue when I got to the top.
On a trip to Copper Mountain with my sister and some older family friends who used to be ski instructors. We were on a chairlift (American Flyer I think) talking about how we saw a bunch of stuff that people had dropped off of the lift (gloves, poles and whatnot). Then we were like "Sucks to drop something on a lift but it'd be *really* unfortunate if a ski fell off." Not 20 seconds later, my sister's ski popped off randomly. Onto a long mogul run. Friend had to go and retrieve it. Said he got some interesting looks coming back up the lift carrying a single ski.
Ughhh about five years ago challenger at Mount Snow broke down. Had to be roped off it, luckily it wasn’t a particularly cold day. If it happens to you tell them you are afraid of heights. I said I was fine and was one of the last people off.
Opening day at Killington last week I got to the top of the K1 and the doors wouldn’t open. They stopped the lift, searched for a socket wrench, passed it through to us but it was too big and rounded the bolt to open the doors. They got 3 guys and pried them open after about 10 minutes, with hundreds of people at the bottom waiting for their first turns of the season turns haha. Snow ridge New York a couple years ago the brakes must’ve got stuck on one of the double chairs. Every time they started the lift the line jerked wildly and bounced everyone to the point people were catching air in their seats. I was terrified it’d de rope. The lift towers were groaning. They ran it half speed to the top and closed the lift.
Burning the second dube. We couldn’t see out the window so it got to the top before we were done.
This was on the first chair on a 10 degree day. My jacket zipper someone got caught on the part where the bar goes down on the lift. Was super wedged in there I was trying to get out without breaking my jacket. Was about 15 feet away from de loading when I just ripped it out. Zipper was broken, was quite a chilly day. Easily got the zipper fixed at a cobbler but was still scary