Skier sues border for severed finger

A snowHead

An Aspen based skier is sueing a Texas snowboarder after allegedly colliding with her and severing part of her pinky finger at Snowmass, Colorado

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/3377439/detail.html

I assume a 'pinky' is a little finger.

A snowHead

That'll teach to stop just as she got off a lift, it's a pet hate of mine the idiots who stop immediately they get off a lift, instead of getting out of the way. Sounds as if she was part responsible for her injury but no doubt she'll get a multi milion dollar settlement or maybe sue the lift operator as well. After all it's got to be someone else's fault hasn't it?

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

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I wouldn't be so smug about US litigation culture; every time I walk through Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester clipboarded young men try to find out if I have an injury I would like to claim damages for...

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Have you also noticed that the incident was in December 2002 and the article was June 2004.........I admit I know nothing about the circumstances of the case but to me it smacks of greed, how can it take a year and half for the dosey idiot to do anything about this.

Jesus christ, accidents happen, no one died! GET OVER IT!!! Evil or Very Mad

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Still, while we're all being superior over this and belittling the US system, I wonder how many here wouldn't swop a small piece of their little finger for a couple of million bucks, given the chance!

After all it is free

I'm coming at this from a slightly different angle as I am currently suing a lift company for negligence that had serious consequences.

I can't discuss it here for obvious reasons, but a search on my surname will probably get you the story.

My point is that sometimes you can't just accept that accidents happen and we need the pressure on operators of potentially dangerous equipment to be kept on their toes with "safe working practices".

A few points:

People are jumping to conclusions based on a couple of lines in a news report. It says she had just got off the lift, it doesn't say whether she had moved away from the area immediately in front of it - she may well have, and it says nothing about what the boarder did or how, merely that they had been on the lift behind her.

It may well have been her fault but there is no way that anyone here can say that with any certainty.

Finally, not knowing much about the legal system, there may be good reason for the delay. I've heard of a number of suits being made late.

I've probably mentioned this before, but it seems that people are quick to jump down the throat of someone making a claim, even when they don't know the full story. One good example of this was the woman who sued McDonalds for the coffee spill. She has been lampooned ever since. Yet few know that she received reduced damages because was partly at fault, and more importantly, the case came about because McDonalds were serving the coffee at over 80C - much higher than is safe, didn't warn anyone about it and that the higher temperature caused far worse damage than normal. They were lucky that her legs that were severely scolded and not some kid's face - say as a customer turned away from a counter. The main result of the action was that McDonalds reuced the temperature at which they stored the coffee.

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A follow-up on Chris and Skanky's points. As a naive and trusting 22 year old I once placed my trust in the legal/insurance systems to fairly settle a claim after my first wife was severely brain-injured following a accident for which the other party was found to be 100% responsible.

It took over two years for the claim to be finalised (the 'experts' have to be sure no further recovery is possible). It took another four years for the final settlement to come through, and I later realised what a paltry sum it was in the circumstances. 70% permanently handicapped, no possibility of ever working, a radically altered personality, a ruined life and relationship.

Today, knowing better, I would have fought for proper recompense. As Chris says, these people have to be kept on their toes. Of course balance is needed, and people do make ludicrous claims, but the bottom line is that the genuine claimants need to be protected...

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PG I do agree with you but some of these begger belief...read on;

Stella Awards

It's time once again to consider the candidates for the annual Stella Awards. The Stella's are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled coffee on herself
and successfully sued McDonalds. That case inspired the Stella awards for the most frivolous successful lawsuits in the United States. The following are this year's candidates:

1.Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $780,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The owners of the store were understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the misbehaving little toddler was
Ms. Robertson's son.

2.A 19-year-old Carl Truman of Los Angeles won $74,000 and medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Mr. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal
his neighbor's hub caps.

3.Terrence Dickson of Bristol, Pennsylvania, was leaving a house he had just finished robbing by way of the garage. He was not able to get the garage door to go up since the automatic door opener was malfunctioning. He couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the house and garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family was on vacation, and Mr.Dickson found himself locked in the garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found, and a large bag of dry dog food. He sued the homeowner's insurance claimingthe situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of $500,000.

4.Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next door neighbor's beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. The award was less than sought because the jury felt the dog might have been just a little provoked at the time by Mr. Williams who was shooting it repeatedly with a pellet gun.

5.A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink and broke her coccyx (tailbone). The beverage was on the floor because Ms. Carson had thrown it at her
boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.

6.Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware, successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor and knocked out her two front teeth. This occurred while Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the ladies room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses.

7.This year's favorite could easily be Mr. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mr. Grazinski purchased a brand new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On his first trip home, having driven onto the freeway, he set the cruise control at 70 mph and calmly left the drivers seat to go into the back and make himself a cup of coffee. Not surprisingly, the R.V. left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Mr. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising him in owner's manual that he couldn't actually do this. The jury awarded him $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually changed their manuals on the basis of this suit, just in
case there were any other complete morons buying their recreation vehicles.

Yes Lorraine, but a 2 ninute internet search would aslo have revelaed that all those stories are false - check out snopes.com

and again, a quote about stella liebnick, when it;s already been shown here that there's a fair biot more to that particular case than is normally shown

You know it makes sense.

I too dislike the ambulance-chasing law firms who try to make money by promoting legal claims of often doubtful merit.

However, when I was stopped in the street recently by someone representing one of these firms and asked if I had recently had an accident I answered no, but I couldn't help tongue-in-cheek suggesting that an appropriate website name for them would be "SueTheBastards.com" Smile

, as this seems to perfectly represent the thinking behind it.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

Sorry nbt. Confused

....only just have time to read my emails and drop in now and again to catch up with you lot.....no time to worry about 2 minute searches........ (these were sent to make me smile on a yucky Monday morning) I just enjoyed them and hoped you would too! Wink

A snowHead

A snowHead

To get back to the case in hand, the prime rule of the slopes is that you should be in control at all times, and be able to stop and avoid other slope users ahead of you. That rule takes precedence over all other rules (don't stop below a blind rise, don't stop in the middle of a narrow section, look upwards before joining a run, don't stop immediately after getting off a lift, etc). If the snowboarder in question was unable to stop in time or avoid the woman in front of him, wherever she was standing, surely he should have been on the nursery slopes and not yet on the main mountain. If everyone on the slopes obeyed the aforementioned prime rule, there definitely would be fewer deaths and injuries. This may sound strange coming from a former downhiller, but only now (after seeing what some idiots get up to on the pistes) do I appreciate how lucky I was to be able to go 80mph on closed runs. If you want to ski fast (ie. approaching or over the limits of your control), register as a Masters racer and enter a downhill or Super G where you will endanger only yourself...

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Agree with all that. Still I'd rather see a pro skiing towards me at 50 mph than the great majority of holiday skiers at lesser speeds! I've always felt safer skiing around the glacier when all the club and national teams are training and tourists are rare, than just after lunch during the main holiday periods!

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ise,
http://www.summitdaily.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040519/NEWS/105190021&rs=1

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ise, But how many of those tree collisions actually take place in the forest or in heavily gladed runs, where skiers/riders are usually picking their way down with care? IMHO the most dangerous place for hitting trees is at the edge of a wide, groomed piste.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

I totally agree withMartin's point above, but what if the woman in question stopped right at the point where you get off the lift? The boarder would have been pushed into her by the chair lift. I doubt this is the case (she'd be stupid to sue in those circumstances), but again we're commenting without knowing the full facts. Which is why we have juries and court cases.

After all it is free

The original article in the Aspen Daily isn't much help... can't link directly, but it says:

Martin Bell, I'm not keen on reading articles like the one in the Summit daily, the race club kids seem to spend half their time dodging trees at speed around Peisey Vallandry and Villaroger during the season at Les Arcs with their trainers. I can't watch (ok, that's mainly because I find it pretty hard to keep up with them Wink

)

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It's not so easy to stop on a snowboard when coming off a lift, especially as you normally have your back foot unstrapped. Also the snow is well packed and generally icey making it difficult to stop, especially for peolpe gaining experience.........I don't agree that the person necessarily shouldn't be on the lift, it may have been a new lift to then, a particularly steep descent, he may even have had a momentary lack of control (as we all do) - back foot slipped off the board and an accident happened. Learner lifts are very different to ones on the main mountain, we were all beginners once and I'm pretty sure no one here stayed on the nursery slopes for a week looking up at the mountain thinking......"oh better not yet go up there", get real everyone was itching to go up and ultimately that's the only way to learn.

Again (as i said earlier) I/we don't know the circumstances around this incident but far too often people crowd the exit to clip up boots and read piste maps and generally have a good natter while waiting for everyone to get up the lifts. Again it's down to lack of understand of how the 2 sports work and how we need to share the mountain for the good of all snowsports! snowHead

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Good points, Dan, and the reasons why I don't much like sharing a chairlift with boarders. If the queue looks like generating a mixed load, I try to use an outside seat which gives a better chance of skiing the runout safely away from any unlucky tumbling boarders. If the lady really was standing in a silly place then there is some obligation on the Liftie to tell her to get out of the way or even to slow or stop the lift until she's clear. From the little we know, this looks like a simple accident which could as just easily have had no unfortunate outcome but Sod's Law was working well that day. The only 'winners' are likely to be the lawyers.
I totally agree with your last paragraph.

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I agree with the last bit too, but what's being said is that some boarders lack the skill to be able to stop when others can. Which means that if they hit someone who isn't immediately in the discharge area, the responsibility for an accident is pretty much down to them.

As Dan says, you can't expect boarding novices to stay on the nursery slopes for ever, but nor can you expect skiing beginners to understand the technical aspects of boarding and its particular difficulties with respect to getting on and off lifts...

Some boarding novices take the board off completely and carry it which minimises the risk of 'out of control' incidents at the top. But as Dan says the discharge slopes are often quite steep and icy so there is still a high risk of falls and then you've got a loose board clattering around which is perhaps worse that one that's attached to a prone body.
Do Boarding Schools give any advice / tuition on this aspect ? As a skier I'd appreciate knowing more about how to interact safely with boarders. Now I tend to the 'keep well clear' school. I suspect this problem on lifts is something we just have to live with. There can't be too many severed digits lying around. Cool

You know it makes sense.

Anyone know the layout of the Two Creeks chair exit? I know I said we're just speculating on the case, but I have an idea to illustrate the point.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

It's easiest & safest just run straight off on a board, but this is generally where people congrigate and so accidents can happen.............not usally with these types of conseqences. Sometimes it is useful to make the point and........ Blush

............. Laughing

A snowHead

I just want to know what a 61 year old female complainant does with her ‘pinky’ (little finger) that the loss of it “prevents her from engaging in her usual duties, hobbies, occupations and avocations”!
This is one I’m gonna follow, purely for its prurient value of finding out what “her usual duties, hobbies, occupations and avocations” are. And to see if the usual septic legal brainfärt contest ensues.
Two creeks? Where's that lift at Aspen. It's not one I remember Puzzled

A snowHead

Masque,
a) Type the letters q, a, and z or p, ;, and ., depending on which hand it was?
b) Snowmass.
Seriously though, I'm not disputing that some of the "seppos" over here are sue-happy. Nor that incidents on chairlift off-ramps are sometimes unavoidable (Warren Miller virtually built a career on that fact). But there has to be a point where people have to be held responsible for crashing into other people. Possibly the most clear-cut case was here in Vail a few years ago:
http://www.skimag.com/skimag/article/print/0,13435,326916,00.html

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Martin Bell, I do that all the time and, with the help of a decent red, occasionally all at the same time.
Then my typing’s not that good but this is quite an extraordinarily wide ranging suit and I will be interested to read the depositions (not been lodged with the court yet as far as I can tell), as it may have repercussions on how us snowheads may be required to behave. Or even the thought that some lift operators may need to look at the speed/capacity of their lift systems and the size/shape/slope of the dismount area.
We just don’t know the facts yet but reading the complaint terms, I’ve an inkling this one’s ‘padded’ to the point of perversion.
As for falling off lifts, . . I have a long and inglorious history . . . including leaving my pants vent open to allow a drag bar to freeze and rip a chunk of skin off me’sack and inner thigh, falling off in pain halfway up and taking out the next three customers.
Wasn’t me guv rolling eyes

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Masque, you're a walking, or stumbling, accident blackspot - aren't you? Very Happy

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laundryman, did you ever see Les Paul playing a few years back? His arthritis has limited how many fingers he can use, yet he is still a musical genius.

Also, a less well-known guitarist, but equally impressive, is Phil Keaggy, who is also "digitally challenged" to use a PC description of having less than the normal compliment of fingers.

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Masque,

holy shizer that must have hurt - just like my cricket ball story, very funny to everyone else but not you!!

After all it is free

Ian Hopkinson, Who me? I'm just a child of misfortune, I figure that for all the cr*p I’m getting in this life the next one’s gonna be real sweet! Ok so currently I’ve a couple of feet of nylon holding my leg together, so what? Even if the surgery doesn’t work there are ways to overcome it. I’ll still be causing havoc next season. Besides I’m trying to wangle a new gym membership and a personal trainer on prescription.
However I have given an undertaken a commitment to a very beautiful skier, not to push the ‘envelope’ as hard as I’ve done in the past – but that’s a very big window of opportunity . . . he he he! I’m still determined to do the ‘Fleche’ on a board and to get properly competent in the ‘steep’ on skis. Besides, ‘Fuxup’(WTFH- you’d’ve had to been there to understand) needs a lesson in cross-curricular snowsport activities. Little Angel

Pulleez guys, go and source any Jango Reinhart track and you'll understand that there’s no such thing a disability, just a barrier of predjustice that shouldn’t be there in the first place, to destroy. Evil or Very Mad

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Masque, I expect you'll come back as something limbless, in an effort to reduce the risk of you injurying yourself Wink

Help!!

Skier sues border for severed finger

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