 Poster: A snowHead
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It was my first time on a board.....I was toe edging along the top of the red run and toppled backwards down the slope. It seemed steep when I was falling 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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The first bit ain't steep, its sideways. if you mind that enter using the blue track, but i doubt thats pleasant for a boarder either.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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reds, blues, what are you lot talking about?
Dumb question number 2 (1st was where is innerwengen?) What's the easier? Red or Blue?
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stab, if you are skiing, blue is the easier...however on a board, red can be better as the blue runs are often flat tracks.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| Ronald wrote: |
http://beo-news.ch/abns%202008/jan%202008/sesselbahn%20unfall%2003.htm
There were 75 people on the Fallboden at the time of the accident around 1pm. They were evacuated.
Winds at the time were measured at 90Kph... an the storm got worse after that.
Fallboden was build in 1982 as a 3 man chair, in 2002 refitted as a 2 man. |
Terrible. There was a big storm last month and I must admit I was not happy on Lager chair as it inched its way towards the top station.
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Ronald,are they saying that someone has died from this ?
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Chris Brookes, I have had a e-mail from Mike Austin of the DHO who reports one dead and three badly injured.
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rJane L, The blue to Brandegg but taking the left hand track at the turn off after Arven and going down the snow covered road that should avoid most of the steeper and flatter sections.
As for todays traggic accident I'm very surprised but if the weather changed as quickly as has been reported it may be that it just couldn't be helped 
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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The dead man was apparently from Germany as was one of the seriously injured people, the other two seriously injured were apparently from Australia, one of them is reported to have head injuries whilst the other is apparently not as serious, looks like two chairs fell to the ground so I'd guess that the rope came off at one of the pylons. A further 40 people were evacuated from the lift but no others seem to have anything other than minor cuts and bruises
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| D G Orf wrote: |
| rJane L, The blue to Brandegg but taking the left hand track at the turn off after Arven and going down the snow covered road that should avoid most of the steeper and flatter sections. |
On a snowboard  I can't imagine a worse run.....certainly the boarders at the MSB last year would get the train down to Brandegg rather than board that run.....and they were both experienced!
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Elizabeth B, the request was for a gentle blue run with no steeps.... it's better than the rat run down from Wengeneralp along the woodpath, and I've seen plenty of boarders manage it easily enough
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Ronald, I've been telling people that this was going to occur for at least 2 if not 3 years, in fact I first announced it here on page 4 of this thread back in April 2004, how's that for advance notice 
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You know it makes sense.
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It was a freak accident - hope we are not getting into apportioning blame.
Stab was right with what happened, Ronald. The people involved were guests of a friend of mine.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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[quote="D G Orf"]edited - see subsequent posts, but please make your preceding post clearer as to its subject matter
BTW - Apart from Elizabeth B being a boarder herself; that Blue Run is 'hated' by the two experienced boarders she alludes too as it is so flat . One of the two used to live in Wengen, so may have done it more than once.
Last edited by Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name: on Fri 4-01-08 10:09; edited 1 time in total
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Poster: A snowHead
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I thought all chairlifts have cable catches to prevent this happening ??
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Chris Brookes, I if the wind lifted the whole lift, it may be pulled beyond the reach of the catches...
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Ronald, Point taken.
However given you refer to both in that post it could be read either way and most would 'read' the context prima facie as I did ( why check?) .. only clear to you as the author.
DGO Suggest you make that post a little clearer as to which lift you are referring to, others may misinterpret as I did.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Agenterre,
Because that was the obvious thing to do. Do you REALLY think D G Orf would have put a winking smiley after a reference to someone's death?!
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Hurtle, It was not 'obvious' - that is your opinion. Clarity only came with Ronalds response, and even a pedant could not be sure of the references . Only Ronald and DGO 'knew' the context; the references are oblique, and why I have asked for DGO to clarify within his original post. In the circumstances any relative/friend/casual observer could misinterpret and form the wrong opinion.
As to the poster's intent? Obviously yes, otherwise I wouldn't have questioned it. Delighted that I misinterpreted.
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Hurtle, the very recent/previous posts by DG Orf were about the unfortunate death and injury to others and in this context I also thought the post was a bit of 'I told you so' and was in bad taste. It is misleading and not many people will head back to page 104, let alone page 4, all a genuine misunderstanding on all accounts. It seems I also missed the obvious.
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OK, to me it was instinctive that almost nobody on this forum, least of all D G Orf whose posts are unfailingly modest, polite and helpful, would post something in such appalling taste. Admittedly though, it did bring me up sufficiently short to check.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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An unfortunate misunderstanding - can we move back on topic again?
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Ok that's what I deserve for posting arround 1am I'm afraid I was a little tired at the time, I was replying to Ronald's, post about the new lift, which I told people about Oh so long ago, obviously yesterdays accident was awful and if I unintentionally seemed to make light of that I'm very sorry, it was not intended.
Now as far as Blue runs for snowboarders go, there are not many blue runs arround Wengen, Elizabeth B, had already suggested the obvious one on the Mannlichen, however the start of that particular blue can be very intimidating for some people, especially as you have to traverse across no less than 3 different red runs at at least 5 locations, perhaps it would have been better to suggest taking the turn off the Brandegg blue and going down to get the Arven Chair back up to Kleine Scheidegg, as for snowboarders hating the route I can't really comment but whilst I don't strap my feet to one myself I do have several friends who board and none of them (including 2 beginners at it) ever had a problem getting to Brandegg by board
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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D G Orf, I think that the question was phrased badly initially. For a minute, forget blue. Instead, think about runs appropriate to boarders who are beginning. Tracks are a definite no. There isn't enough space to turn, so you spend the whole way down on one egde. This is baaaad. Certainly in my experience of boarding (I have extensive experience of being a beginner  ) steep is better than narrow. Once you have edge control, you can just "scrape" down if you can't turn.
What a beginner boarder wants is wide and gentle (but not flat). The nearest run to this at wengen is the Mannlichen run (the red one NOT the blue one). The other run that would be okay would be the Lauberhorn (the one from the chair back to KS rather than the race track!!). The 1st bit is a pain, and there is the track part way down, but they are both short enough that you can get away with "scraping" down on a heel edge.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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http://beo-news.ch/abns%202008/jan%202008/sessellbahn%20freitag%2004.htm
The lift does have cable catches. When the cable falls off the guiderolls the lift will automatically do an emergency stop. The article mentions during the emergency stop the cable was levered off the catches.
The accident investigators didn't find technical damage to the lift that could have led to the accident.
2 of the 3 injured have left the hospital.
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You know it makes sense.
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Ronald, It figures, I would imagine that the fatal injury and the other 3 less injured people were on adjacent chairs, just very unlucky I guess
From what is said I think what happened is that the cable came off the wheels which activated the emergency stop, unfortunately as this occured an additional force (probably a high gust of wind) hit the chair at the same time, the two forces combined were sufficient to wrench the cable from the track and cause it to drop completely, unfortunately these things can happen especially in unexpected conditions, the Fallboden lift is probably the most vunerable to this sort of thing due to its slow speed and long distance combined with its exposed location as this means that in the event of high winds it still takes a lot of time to clear the lift of existing passengers, after this traggic incident I would not be surprised to see the Fallboden lift being replaced with a faster more modern design in the near future
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Even a drag would be saver (and faster!) then this Fallboden I think. Drags withstand wind a lot easier
Fallboden and Tschuggen are (within a handful of meters) the same length, yet Tschuggen is 4 minutes faster. I'd use Fallboden a lot more if it were like one of these old Habegger drags.
I'm not sure a faster chair would help. I been on Lauberhorn last year when a defect developed, and they unloaded the passengers in some emergency mode, and that was not any faster then half a meter per second (almost 5 times slower then Fallboden in normal operation) Got to the top well after normal piste patrol times, Wixi was already unloaded of all its chairs and shut down.
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Poster: A snowHead
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Ronald, as I understand it in this case they had stopped people getting on the Fallboden chair due to the high winds and were just waiting for the last passengers to get off, obviously with a faster lift that would have taken less time, however I don't know if in this case it would have saved the mans life
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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D G Orf, at normal operating speeds that would have taken 11 minutes. The accident happened around 25 minutes after they stopped taking on passengers. Obviously the lift wasn't able to run at normal speeds. A fast detachable chair would not be able to run at normal speeds either. You're assuming a fast chair would be able to run faster in emergency conditions, i'm not sure due to the similarity guiding the cables.
When I was on the Muttleren (of rather similar design) in storm they ran it very slowly, with lots of pauses. Took half an hour to unload and i was about the last to enter. Muttleren is a little more then a thirth the length of Fallboden.
I wouldn't be suprised if they only were able to run the lift for just a thirth the distance needed to unload everybody.
I won't stop using these lifts, but it does make me think
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Ronald, how was your night drive?
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Has the lift stopped working now for the season ?
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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no idea, I'm rarely over that side these days mainly because I'm sick of it and the bottle neck of people it creates. It's all about the mannlichen these days but that will change when the park is built at bumps.
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| Quote: |
Anyone know what happened to the guy who keeps www.wengen.com going
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he's still around but busy as hell.
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stab, Quite good, arrived 5 in the morning, slept till 10 got up reasonably fresh... I miss something looking out of the windows ;(
Saw the crashed bus (http://beo-news.ch/abns%202008/jan%202008/vu%20sieben%20verletzte%2004.htm) just where you turn on the road to Thun coming down from Wilderswil.
Looked less severe...
Chris Brookes The second item on beo-news mentions something about more investigations and questioning still taking place, and may take some more time. I wouldn't count on Fallboden running this season anymore tbh. (if not just for psychological reasons).
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Ronald, I wouldn't be so sure, I'm not saying you're wrong, it's just that if the investigation finishes quickly I would expect them to get the lift working pretty soon
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I expect it to be back up and running, they will be a bit touchy about it in the wind and close it sooner most likely from now on though, just like after 99 with the flashing avalanche warning light by the train station, someone farts by the park hotel and they seem to light it up these days.
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FAQ
