 Poster: A snowHead
|
|
whats the most spectacular crash you have had on the piste?
|
|
|
|
|
|
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
|
In Livigno in 2003 I was on an easy blue run when I decided to dip off the edge of the piste to get past a group of beginners. As I was about executing a left-hand turn back towards the piste I noticed that there was a drop of about 3 feet at the apex of my turn - in to flat ground. My ski tips went straight in, throwing me forward. My bindings released allowing me to continue head first into the snow. I can remember the crash quite clearly. I came around after a few seconds with my right arm across my body, my goggles under my chin and my rucksack on my head. I checked my jaw and face for blood and injury - luckily there was neither.
As I pushed with my right arm to get up it gave way. Two hours later I was in trauma clinic, half naked and cold, waiting for an x-ray. No obvious injury was diagnosed, and I was given a sling and some anti-inflamatories.
Four months later, after £400 in physio and private health care, the rotator cuff tendonitis was tolerable. It was a good few weeks before I could lift a glass to drink, and two years before I could lift the same weight I could before I went.
I still get trouble from it.
Touch wood, still I still haven't broken anything beyond my nose and the odd rib.
|
|
|
|
|
|
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?
|
|
wow,thats a big crash,i broke my wrist last year in sauze but i did it in such a lame way,it was my first time away boarding and after 3 days of lessons i thought i was ready for a blue run,so a local told me of a nice easy run(think it was clotes)so i jump on the lift and its my first time coming off a lift on a board and know one had told me how to get off the other end,i come off the other end,pick up some uncontrollable speed,crash through some spectators and fell on my wrist,then boarded down the hill and had alot of beer to take the pain away.
|
|
|
|
|
|
You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
|
|
|
|
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
|
|
|
|
You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
|
|
shouldnt laugh i know,but iam,sorry
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The most dangerous I remember was on my second trip with school in 1993.
We were in a group and I was hanging near the back so as to get some speed. The group pulled into a lift que unexpectantly. I had far too much speed to stop in time and ended up mowing down half the lift que. They my momentum took my over a little drop where I finally stopped. No physical damage, but I rightly got a bollocking from the instructor.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
A friend of mine had a pretty shocking wipeout in chamonix last year, a boarder decided to jump back on to the piste in front of him just as he was hitting a lip flat out, he took off in the middle of trying to avoid the guy and landed very badly onto the concrete piste with only one ski coming off (about five of us had already gone down and initially hung around laughing and then realised that he wasn't at moving at all)...anyhow he'd got a very nasty compund fracture, bone coming out of the side of the leg etc, very unpleasant.
He then got airlifted off the mountain and i skied down and drove his fiancee to the local hospital in cham, while they we waited for them to stabilise him for the transfer to Sallanches i got chatting to a woman in a wheelchair who seemed to have damaged both legs and it was a bit of a classic accident. It was her 1st or 2nd time skiing and she had just learnt how to skate along. Whilst trying out her new trick and skating slowly along something went pretty wrong, she picked up a bit of speed, started doing the splits and couldn't stop herself or bail out of some reason, so she went along legs getting wider and wider until she dislocated both kneecaps!! Ouch!! Very unfortunate injury though because they just kept popping as of course all the ligaments etc had been stretched so badly.
|
|
|
|
|
|
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
|
|
Too many to mention them all. One when I used to snowboard stands out. It ended up with both my feet coming out of my boots, leaving them stuck in the bindings on the board going down the hill, and me stood on the piste in my socks.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
|
|
Going down to St Martin in 3V on board, caught edge at side of Piste and chin butted the Piste - bit a large part of lip. Nothing to serious but serious amounts of blood
|
|
|
|
|
|
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.
|
non skiing crash.....ironically enough having just described somebody's else's crash, i went to my kitchen, bent down to something up off floor and promptly cut my head open on the very unforgiving granite breakfast bar whilst standing up 
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Beakyshark, Did the same thing on a marble mantlepiece. "ITS A BLEEDER"
|
|
|
|
|
|
You know it makes sense.
|
|
|
|
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
|
 thats a good one
|
|
|
|
|
|
Poster: A snowHead
|
|
|
|
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
|
|
2005 in Axamer Lizum on a very icy piste, doing some nice safe turns on a blue slope but it was a steep section of this slope, some idiot ploughs into the back of me at top speed sending me face first down an icy slope. Finally stopped wiped the snow from my face with a nose bleed and some bluey orange bruising on my arm!!!
|
|
|
|
|
|
brian
brian
Guest
|
|
|
|
You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
|
|
|
|
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
|
On one of my earliest ski trips, I fell on the slalom slope in Flaine (which I shouldn't have been on, with my total inexperience). I slid straight down on my back, head first, until I succeeded in turning myself round and stopping. I looked back up and saw that I'd ploughed a trench right down the middle of it as I went. The real skiers practising on it weren't amused. Luckily a friend brought me down my skis and we beat a hasty retreat!
Another time was with the ESF in Val D'Isere when the class had come to a rest on the right near the bottom of a run before the lift and I was just coming down on the left. Unhappily, there was a series of rolling humps of increasing size on that left side. I had deferred success at absorbing them adequately. I was thrown up high, did a backflip and landed in a heap in front of an appreciative audience. It felt like everyone on the mountain was wetting themselves laughing.
|
|
|
|
|
|
You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
|
Tobogganing accident, travelling on the back, looking over the front persons shoulder, bang over a bump, split one of my canine teeth in half lengthways,
could not eat for the rest of the week as the pain was so great. Got back to the UK, and the remaining part of the tooth was so hard to pull out
as they could not get enough leverage on the tooth, they had to drill a hole through it and pass a wire through it to pull it out. Mouth ached for ages.
|
|
|
|
|
|
brian
brian
Guest
|
|
|
|
|
|
In Val d'Isere some years ago I came down the Santons run back to Val. We stopped at the top of the longish schuss at the bottom of the barrel to re-group and I noticed, as the hordes skied past down, that right at the low-point of the dip was a group of pedestrians in the middle of the piste, one elderly French woman with her dog. But the animal was calm and watched benignly as the crowds skied by. I set off second in our group and skied down the very left margin of the piste, being aware of the hound. I got to the bottom of the schuss at peak momentum and was feet away from the pedestrians when the dog decided on harakira and ran straight across in front of my skis. Sharp left turn (did not want to turn into the path of any skigods flying down behind me), hit the dog side-on, slewed further leftwards and managed to avoid the metal railings before flying off the edge of the piste, down ten foot and landing upright, on one ski still, in the river.
I struggled out of my ski and hauled my way back up the embankment, to meet as I emerged one of the girls in our party, who was really very concerned - she wanted to know how the dog was.
|
|
|
|
|
|
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
|
nlinesw4, - was the dog ok? 
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
In a whiteout in the 3Vs and retreating down to Meribel, after being the last on the hill to do so, I skiied into the enormous snowbaord park and fell into the half pipe smacking my head on the hard pack. it utterly disoreintated me and it took me some half hour to get out of what felt like an obstacle course on acid.
By the time I emerged, I had a throbbing head and I honestly was unable to tell which way was up or downhill. It was a totally surreal experience and showed to me how quickly you can find yourself vuberable on the mountain.
I visted the clinic in town who advised day of rest.
lessons learnt....eh none really, other than buy decent whiteout googles.
|
|
|
|
|
|
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
|
|
|
|
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.
|
O So many to choose from...
Earlist recall is someone else: - ( and no, this is not Urban myth, it really happened to me - if pressed I can reveal names) Skiing with school in mid 70s: piste has turn at the bottom of steep section, large orange fence protecting innocents from tree-lined ravine that is "straight on", should you choose to go that way....
School mate, last one down of class, loses control, sits back on skis: sails passed assembled masses waiting for him, disappears under Orange crash netting, and over the edge. As 15 year olds, our first reaction is not to help but fall about laughing.
Eventually we climb across slope to his exit point and look into said ravine. He is in tree, skis stuck across branches at piste level, hanging up side down, still in bindings.
You think this may have been less amusing? - wrong. People were falling about in the snow unable to breathe, unable to stand, it was hysterical. For those of us not hanging from the tree, obviously.
Instructor had to get help, to release him from skis while another stood beneath him to make sure when he fell, he did not slide down into said ravine.
I can recall the pain of the laughter even now.
Same trip, we were skiing between other trees - I was very proud of the fact that I was first to arrive at the stopping point with instructor, having made it past both fixed obstacles ( trees) and variables (fellow classmates in heaps.) Of course pride is never a good thing, and as I stood smugly there, there was a 'cracking' sound, and the ice bridge over the forest stream I had chosen to rest upon, gave way.
Landing me up to my knees in fast flowing ice cold mountain spring water. Which made for an extremely uncomfortable rest of the day.
The most recent embarrassemnt happened last year: a large germanic lady of a certain age plus husband were performing sweeping turns down one side of a blue in Les Arcs 1800, - I was in sync' with them on the other side of the piste: as you can imagine, eventually, both of us went of the same piece of snow at 180 degrees to each other , and there was a face-to-face coming together at pace. Hilarity ensued from my party.
So, we got up, dusted each other down, checked for equipment breakages / loss, apologised, calmed down irate husband, and set off.
2 turns later, the two of us did it again.
No one else was capable of picking up the pieces, due to convulsions.
There are many more (so many more), but its late...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Many years ago in Borovets on the last day of trip I was just too tired to turn and thought I'd just do one big stop at the bottom of the slope (I thought I knew the run quite well), built up way too much speed and I'd forgotten about the small trench running across the slope. Hit it pretty hard and took off, landed in a heap with a ski tip by my left ear. Ski had gone up inside my jacket from the bottom and punched out through the shoulder.
Not a scratch on me
Worst thing is no one witnessed my finest ever wipeout
|
|
|
|
|
|
You know it makes sense.
|
Hi all first post as total newbie very keen to get into winter sports but after laughing my azz off for the last half hour don't know now if it's still a good idea or not 10 / 10 for the thread by the way,..........oggy 
|
|
|
|
|
|
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
|
|
oggy, welcome to snowHeads.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Poster: A snowHead
|
Crash 1)
Location: Wengen (second only in 'World's Best Resorts'TM to La Rossiere)
Year: 1985
Occurrence: I was a bit over-confident and hit a lip in a tuck. I have, to this day, absolutely no idea what happened but i ended up with a raw graze about an inch and a half long across my chin and somehow managed to crack the tail on one of my rental skis
Crash 2)
Location: Flachau
Year: 2004
Occurrence: Powder day. It was about lunchtime. I came out of the trees onto the edge of the piste (and yes I did look to check for oncoming traffic). Floated through what was left of the powder towards the groomed stuff and as I hit the corduroy I flipped, somersaulted about 5 times and whacked my head a lot. I've worn a helmet ever since.
Neither of these are particularly horrific - is that because I don't try hard enough?
My friend smashed his elbow in Meribel one year - I now call him Murali .... (apologies for the cricket-related joke on this particular morning).
|
|
|
|
|
|
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
|
|
chamonix.. going for a bit of speed.. eyeing a nice long flat runout 200 yards ahead.. neck n neck with another boarder.. he was much better and riding it flat i was on the toe edge , i had been having trouble with turns onto the heel adge all day, so one at this speed was always gonna end in tears. caught the toe edge got some air, not sure what angle i was at but i didnt face plant it fortunatly.. after some kind of mid air twisty spin thing i landed facing up the hill went over onto my back side then (and this is the only bit where i really knew where i was) i waited for the back of my head to hit the deck.. ouch.. natch i got straight up got my hat n sunglasses and set off straight away to fal lover straight away a gain.. the girl who stopped looked really worried, so im assuming it looked quite good as well
|
|
|
|
|
|
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?
|
Lots of crashes myself, of course, but mostly way-back (I won't go through my Victoria fall or the avalanche again).
Long ago when I skied mostly rather fast on piste and had almost no experience of any sort of jumping, I was in Les Arcs. There was a place where I could go off piste a bit, up a steep bank, which gave me extra height, and then take a section straight which got me going really fast - as fast as I dared go. Just when I got to maximum there was a slight up slope and then gently down again. I was going so fast I really had to use my skill not to take off at the top of this slight swell.
My friends persuaded me instead of trying not to take off, next time to actually make it a jump. Well, peer pressure and all that... I got going really fast and got to the top of the hump and pushed off. I was in the air for what must have been at least 4 or 5 seconds but seemed double that - I remember thinking When am I going to get down, what the hell am I doing up here, what do I do when I land??? Then I did land and my skis were not quite parallel: they both came off on impact and I whammed down full length and shot off like a torpedo down the gentle piste. Since I was totally winded I could do nothing, I just slid on and on till I stopped more than 150 yards away, some way along a completely flat secton of piste. It was a while before I could sit up and look around. There on the horizon was someone with my skis looking around in every direction to see who they might belong to.
Of course my friends were pissing themselves (it had looked like some cartoon accident, they said). And except for cracking my goggles, once I got my breath back I found I was, to everyone's surprise, OK.
|
|
|
|
|
|
You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
|
In Whistler last season, I was skiing down to the left of Harvey's Meadows and spotted the rest of my group side-stepping up a little embankment just near the tree-line.
Now it has to be said that side-stepping up hills, that look easy enough to ski up, is a bit of a waste of energy so I made the decision to get up a bit of speed and ski up the little hill instead. What I didn't initially notice was my group-mate skiing parallel to me, trying to do exactly the same thing... Luckily for him, there wasn't such a change in incline at the bottom of his side of the hill as there was on mine.
It was one of those moments when I thought, what could possibly go wrong!
I got to the bottom of the incline with a bit of speed, my bindings made that fateful click click sound as they double-ejected me through the air, overtaking my group-mate (he went diving off to the side into a big pile of snow to get out of the way), and I did a perfectly symmetrical single-somersault, landing on my face in a big pile of snow. I even remember tucking my head under as I flew threw the air. 
Then my friend (a nurse) said "Don't move!". My immediate thought was that I'd broken/dislocated something, but then she only wanted to get her camera out. 
|
|
|
|
|
|
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
|
Not seen much yet, and not really had any crashes worthy of this forum.
But one funny thing in Val d back in Feb was when we all went on the drag lift on the nursery slope for the first time. A few people just couldn't get off the thing properly and one person managed to get off the wrong side and began to ski back down between the ones going up and thew ones going down. There was a small kid's ski school sitting in the middle for some reason and all I can remember now was the guy trying to snowplow to stop colliding with them all. Amusing first afternoon's skiing, naturally we all found it very funny, cause he wasn't a small man either, just completely helpless.
Another one was one of the last couple of days after which there had been some lovely snowfall over night and we got to the top of the fenicular and were coming down the beginning of the ungroomed piste. got to the bottom of the section and waiting for the others when another person came down at speed and try parallel stopping, but had a little too much momentum and ended up ass in the snow in the position you might be if you got yer bum stuck in a bin with legs out the top etc. Good little chuckle there.
Seems like I'm missing out on more spectacular action though.
|
|
|
|
|
|
You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Les Arcs a couple of years back now I had surveyed a promising little ledge of about 6 feet to try my first airbourne experience. (First intentional at least.) As I had a new camera and my then girlfriend (Now dispatched as a direct result of shortcomings soon to be divulged) was appointed to ski down to the aforementioned ledge with extensive and clear instructions to notify me of a clear run and also how to operate the camera.
I set up and cajoled myself into an Eddie the Eagle like serenity, all coiled snake and cold blooded killer lurking within. With a good run up of about 50 meteres on fairly bluish slope I soon picked up some of the speed I assumed I would need once the instruction to go had been given. As the lip approached I felt marvellous and so confident, I knew I could carry this off, I soared for a few seconds before encountering another drop of about 6 feet which was executed with something approaching the sensation one has when an oyster is lodged in your throat covered in tabasco and you like neither oysters nor pepper; to say my heart dropped when the final step of this infernal staircase hoved into view would be conjecture as I have little remembrance of it, in fact I never will, because the diabolical hussy who should have taken that photo was busy rolling around at the top of the slope!
I did get a photo of the perfect impression my face gave in the crisp snow at the bottom of the three tiers though, Madame Tussauds couldn't do better...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
brian, Comment about snow fences and Scotland has reminded me of a crash at Glenshee the first year I moved up here. Was teaching myself to do short radius parallel turns on the GS run at Glenshee. Typical Scottish conditions - ie the best snow was a piste basher width down by the fence and it was a bit icy in places. Lost my edge as I was turning away from the fence. Slid side on into the fence. The ski tips went through the fencing and stopped dead slamming me in to the fence. No injury to me other than a massive bruise on my shoulder, but the skis were nicely woven through the fencing like willow in a hurdle. Unfortunatley the skis were terminally injured with the tip of one completley delaminated and flapping 
|
|
|
|
|
|
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
|
a picture says a thousand words.........
This was following cutting the corner in a tuck on a track down the mountain in Verbier many years ago....
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mucking about in Soll one year, we were all snowballing each other. One mate slows to scoop up more snow to throw at me but slips and falls flat on his face. Another friend was following fairly closely with the intention of splatting him but instead (and with a helpful shove from behind from another friend) can't stop in time and ends up skiing right between prone friend's legs.
Luckily, there was not much speed involved as prone friend's pelvis managed to stop the ski. I think we spent the best part of an hour waiting for him while he sat on the nice cold snow, periodically slipping a hand in his trousers to check whether the dampness was blood or just sweat.
We were informed the next day by his girlfriend that he had a lovely-coloured, ski-shaped V on his biffon
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
FAQ
. The runs are easy so I work on form and was pushing myself cutting a bit through the trees.. I tried to cut right hard unknowingly on top of an ice patch and my skis rocketed out from under me and I broke my fall with the side of my hip on solid, hard ice. that hurt pretty bad and left a good bruise. No significant injuries to date, knock on wood.
(Right under the chair lift as well.....) 
and the cheeky git's insurance co tried to claim against me !
