children, incidents and button lifts

A snowHead

My five year old has always had an interesting relationship with button lifts. I post this to flush out any other peoples' experiences...

My wee one started at 2 and a half, and by three and a half had grown skilled and confident enough to attempt buttons. This was usually fine. Only he's a small and light child. Most buttons were fine - make sure skis straight, pisteur in attendance, make sure Alex is ready, flick the little lever switch and off he goes...

But...you recall that one button in fifty is that broken spring one...where you mount up, the spring unwinds, and....nothing happens...then suddenly, you're off at top speed, lower back wrenched into a weird backwards shape, groin thoroughly traumatised...and then you stop...only for the whole thing to happen again as you basically kangaroo up the slope in a series of giant, delayed hops.

OK, this is all very well for an adult, but for a lightweight three year old, these rogue buttons mean a leap half a metre in the air, a sideways haul through the air at high speed, with a landing which may or may not be a catastrophic explosion of snow and kit. To give him great credit, despite a black eye sustained by such madness, he always accepted this as a necessary part of skiing and simply got back on the lift...he was never as traumatised as I or the pisteurs were.

I just wished the this was the end of it. But then there was the day he got on a fearsomely long drag. He went in front, I went behind, to deal with any falling off. I had prepared him for the off at the end, but it turned out the buttons were a long way apart, and he was many metres in front of me...out of shouting range. I just hoped that he would notice the off point. Anyway, my partner had gone ahead and would make sure he got off OK. Only she wasn't waiting...my daughter had skied off without stopping and my partner had followed her. And Alex DID NOT notice the off point...so he goes up a steep bank, past the window of the small cabin, with a shocked pisteur staring out of the window, on and on up the 45 degree bank, over the top, and finally letting go when his skies rip out a line connected to an 'off' switch. So off come my skis and I leg it to the top, where I find him on his back, in deep snow, laughing his head off. Phew.

That was last year. This year everything goes well, and I keep my fingers crossed. He goes up and down the pistes at Plaine Morte, coping with the fast button with no problem. I notice that he's keeping his sticks on his wrists for early get away at the top, and I toy with telling him to take them off and hold them in his left hand, but I've been instructing him a lot and this just seems like nagging. So I leave it. On the last run of the last day of the season, I am getting the button lift to the top station to go back down the hill by cable car, humming to myself and reflecting on a great few weeks' skiing - and when I get to the off point I see the awful sight of my son halfway up a 50degree slope, about two metres up above the exit piste, my partner desperately trying to reach him and failing - yes, he's failed to get off again, but this time he's in the area with the buttons smash into the slope with a LOT of force. I think quickly, and since my partner is doing the job of getting him down, I grab a piste pole and bat the buttons way from him as they fly through the air. OK, all is kind of under control, although suddenly one person veers off the right, I can't reach the button and it whacks my partner on the head (she later says she didn't feel it, although there's a bit divot in her helmet), only....she is failing to get him down...he's really dug his skies across the slope to support himself and won't come down...and she can't reach him over a lip in the slope. I keep on batting buttons, which are coming thick and fast...too fast for me to leave things be and get my skis off, and then climb the bank...if I tried to, he would most likely be hit by two or three buttons. I shout at her to get him down, and fast. This does not go down well. I carry on batting buttons. She carries on failing to get him down. I wonder whether I can keep this up this for a couple of hours, since no one seems to be bothering to tell the pisteurs that chaos has broken out. Finally, a guy who has been struggling with a ski-kite on the glacier all morning hoves into view - he's six foot something and simply goes over, pushes my partner out of the way, reaches up, and grabs my son's skis and drags him down to piste level. Phew...I put the button-bashing pole back and thank him. And then get an earful from my partner. Oh well.

I speak gently to my son and try to find out what went wrong. It wasn't that he forgot or didn't notice the off point, he just couldn't get the button away from him since he's tiny, and the spring was at full extension - and turns out that his poles were restricting his arm movements - I indeed should have told him to remove them and hold them in his left hand - he could then have wrestled with the button and released it, simply by dropping his sticks.

anyone else....?

A snowHead

When I was little I had a coat that went down to my knees - the button would always get stuck in it, I remember getting dragged along after the get-off point ssoooooo many times. I also used to manage to hit myself in the head with button lifts a lot too, which is why I first started wearing a helmet (used to hate my 'rents forcing me to wear one when I was a kid, strangely I don't like skiing without one know though!). One of my worst ski experiences was on a drag lift on my Anwarter course, we'd been messing around with skiing on only one ski, then the trainer made us go up St Anton's longest drag lift on one leg too - agony.

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

One of our party tells the tale of skiing in France many years ago. A young child fell off in the middle of a long Poma ride several buttons in front of him. Said child ended up in a heap in the middle of the track - right in front of his mum who was on the next button. Mum simply stepped out of the way and continued on up the hill while the child called "Mamman! Mamman!" after her. Of course, everyone else followed suit while the child slid gently back down the hill calling "Mamman!".

All good character building stuff!

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how about you carry his poles? That's if such a teeny one really needs them at all.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Many many years ago I was on a particularly steep T-Bar with the ski school class, when someone came off the lift higher up and slid down the track hitting the legs of the child on the next tbar in front of me, I can still remember the crunch as his legs went followed by a lot of screaming and blood all over the piste, it was at a point where I couldn't get off the lift so I had to wait on the lift for (what seemed to a small child like hours) probably no more than 10 - 15 mins, whilst they sent a rescue sled down and picked up the injured child, can still remember my skis leaving red trails up the slope as I went up through the bloody snow left behind, even now more than 30 years later I'd have avoided that lift, it's now been replaced with a chairlift so I no longer have to worry

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When I first skied (Chatel Feb'84) either nobody had told me to take my pole straps off of my wrists when on a lift or I was doing what most 14 year olds do with good advice (probably the first 'cos I wasn't that kind of kid NehNeh

). About half way up a button lift that went up a track through the trees I fell over and the button managed to get itself wedged between my arm/hand and my pole. I did a Superman impression for what seemed like ages but was probably only a few seconds before the lift was stopped and I managed to extract myself. I really was a snow head then! I couldn't ski down the track, didn't want to walk up it, so had my first taste of trying to ski powder through trees! Not very elegant from any angle.
So now when I castigate my young nieces for not releasing their pole straps I have a 'war story' to illustrate the point. They still look at me and wonder if its true though! snowHead

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

All the button lifts I use regularly have a big picture illustrating the holding of two poles in one hand, IIRC.

I regularly carry poles for beginner friends. They're just a hazard on lifts (and much of the rest of the time, too, for most beginners).

D G Orf, Shocked

that's horrendous.

After all it is free

valais2, sounds a nightmare. As he is so teeny could you not consider going up together till he gets a bit bigger/stronger?

A good few years ago I was skiing up on Hintertux in September, and my daughter then 7 years old would only go on the T bars alone , so I sent her up on the T Bar that goes up by the Gefrorener Wand, its very steep and quite long and I went on the one behind her.
About half way up at the steepest point as she is so light it just lifted her up in the air. She didn´t go too high but had a total panic attack and just let go, and I saw her falling down towards me, it was really just blue glacial ice so she picked up a lot of speed quickly and there was no way of stopping so I tried to break her fall which was a stupid and dangerous thing to do with my skis on, and we both ended up falling the whole way down, about 100 meters or so. Got holes in our skipants, lost most of the equipment too, so had to trudge back up and get it all, we were the only people up there so no one to help us, and then she refused to go back on the lift, so we had to walk for ages across the ice till we found a chair lift. Not a good memory at all.

MontriondSkier, Laughing

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There is also a T bar in Slovenia that I actually refused to ride after one go. It it the steepest, narrowest T bar I have ever been on, Primoz may know it it´s where they run the Pokal Loka race , it terrified me Shocked

snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

Personally, it sounds to me like your child needs to avoid button lifts for a couple of seasons. There'e plenty of resorts with magic carpets, or you can ride the lift with them in front of you (if you are able to) - the above description sounds like a nightmare with significant hazards for both the child and anyone else trying to help. Not a recipe for a fun and relaxing day on the slopes.

It sounds like you are not far from a situation which could be very traumatic for your son, which may put him off button lifts for a long time, and/or skiing altogether.

And people wonder why I don't want to have kids right now, and avoid going near lifts with them...

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Yup, put him on a chair instead, then he can fall of like the ten year old in our group did a couple of weeks ago. Kids, all they are is a cause of panic and heartache (and wallet ache.)

Not one of mine for a change, tho, so all's well Wink

kooky, that sounds grim. Shocked

I'm sure I'd have done the same thing - tried to break the fall - not much time to think in that situation.

You know it makes sense.

pam w, yes it never happened before that she was just lifted up like that so I didn´t expect it, and she was 2 t-bars ahead of me so I had a bit of time to dither about what I should do, but by then she was travelling pretty fast. We look back at it and laugh now( well I do) but it coud have really put a little un off.

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

Very interested in your responses. I mithered about whether to post about these incidents since:

A they made me sound like a bit (a lot?) of an idiot (it's a distinct possibility that I am)
B it seems like we don't care about the welfare of our children (we do)
C they nonetheless might flush out some amusing and worrying incidents from which we can all learn

Issue C seemed to trump B and A so I posted.

First of all, thanks for the message of concern – be assured he’s certainly not traumatised by these experiences – interestingly he’s responded to my natural approach – talk about it, sort out what went wrong, and make sure that the same thing or something related to it does not happen again. I indeed take him up with me when needed – either on a very difficult tow or when there are huge queues. But he likes going by himself (he is both skilled and confident, but obviously at that age lacks some imaginative understanding of what risks there are and what might go wrong). I very actively seek to avoid putting him and his sister on things which are likely to be outside their competence and may really scare them.

I agree with the sound advice given in these responses (and enjoyed the stories) – his instructors expect him to carry and use sticks, since they are working on his skills on steeps and bumps – so the lesson there is not for me to carry them, but to make sure he takes them off and carries them – which was the diagnosed cause of the second event. Again, he is expected to be very self-sufficient in his instructed time, so I encourage him to take lifts and know how to use them.

On whether he is put off – definitely not – spoke to him tonight and he barely understood why there should be any concern, although he said (and remember he's only five) '...hmmm, well, I think I'd like to practice on some other buttons a bit, ones which don't lift me in the air quite so much..' which seems fair – basically he knows that skiing has hazards, and in the light of what happened, and gently discussing it immediately after it happened, now knows not to wear his poles, to make sure of the off point and knows of the need to work actively to release the button.

Thanks for the advice on carpets. But in fact he (5) and his sister (7) are way beyond magic carpets –he skies some off piste and on anything in resort however steep, bumpy or icy – but he actually loves a couple of hours messing around on the carpets, so at the end of a morning or afternoon we sometimes head off to the infant zone to back bottom about.

My genuine fear is kids messing about on chairs. I have taught mine to have their bums back and their hands holding the bar or arms over the bar – this gets them into the safest position – sitting back is almost the worst thing to do re possible sliding underneath the bar.

Re not having the chance to ski with kids – I have learned more about my faults and about correcting them through skiing slowly with my youngest than almost any other activity. I was in a thermal bath with Al Powell (name drop) and as the steam rose into the winter night sky and the snow fell on out heads, I idly said that I’d learned more messing around following exact turns with my son (on his 4 metre radius skis) than with may other exercises. Al assumed his most inscrutable Confuscius smile – ‘…that’s because it’s hard to ski SLOW…’ he wisely said. And I’ve found that to be true. Helped me improve significantly when all I thought I was doing was mooching about. Plus, it’s a joy to see them learn so much so fast.

A snowHead

Just so you don't get completely the wrong idea about the guy, next time you're in the tub ask him about when he assembled his group on a track, explained carefully that we were going to ski across the meadow, through the trees to a bridge below. Then set off over the lip of the track, hit the meadow below and promptly double ejected out of the front - classic!

A snowHead

i watched a small child come to the top of a button lift, release slightly too early, slides a bit and fall over. father is coming up the lift behind her, talking in soothing italian tones to her, releases his button just as child stands up, and child is hit in head by button. child screams, father looks sheepish.

Luckily she was wearing a helmet, so we could laugh at the slapstick element of it without worryng about her head injury.

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

The use of all lift types was as important as learning to ski per se when my kids were taught in Switzerland. The instructors taught one lift type a week, rope tow (with handles on), poma, T bar and Chair. Child X could not progress to the next lift until they had been signed off for that lift. In the small resort the pisteurs knew where the kids were in terms of lifts and were always there watching the kids to make sure no incidents occurred outside of lessons and would help them on an off where necessary - when very tinies were riding on their own you would see them radio the person at the top when one that needed watching was on board - I simply cannot fault that small resort for the care and attention they gave to small kids. The only problems I heard of was with my friend's young and very light-framed daughter who apparently couldn't ride one of T-bars alone when she was very small as she simply wasn't heavy enough on the spring to keep her skis on the piste!!

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OK here's mine;

We were in Morzine with my children (7&10) and had been using a nice run all afternoon, it had the choice of a chair or a button to get back to the top. On one run we went down to find the chair had broken down and the only way back was by the button, which we knew wasn't particularly nice... ok for adults with some experience but not children who had no real experience of button lifts... so my partner and I ummd and aaaahd for a while thinking and then followed suit of a lot of other parents in the same boat where they went up with their child... it appeared as though the child sat on the button and the adult held the pole...... we lined up and set off and all was going well...

The suddenly the lift stopped for what seemed like an eternity....... I heard from in front my partner call that she couldn't hold on any longer (and tbh my arms were burning too), Kate gave my youngest clear instructions... "keep that button between your legs, keep your knees together and hold on for all your worth until you see the get off sign" she also called to the adult in front to ask them to keep an eye...... with that her arms gave way and she slid backwards, turned and went back down the piste.... we sat there for a while longer, both my girls seemed ok with it all but by this time my arms too were shaking..... I gave my eldest the same instructions "do not let go"....... I dropped off and went to the side of the track... the lift started and both girls coped well, and I watched as they carried on up the lift.

If was too fast for me to run and keep up so I just stood and watched... we were within sight of the top.... about 100m from the get off point I saw my youngest fall, followed by my eldest.....

With mine and my partners final words of advice in their heads, they kept their knees together and hung on for dear life.......... dragged sideways up the track... they seemed oblivious to the fact that had lost their skis, poles, hat & goggles and their salopets were hanging round their knees filling up with snow ....... as they approached the "get off sign" you heard them shout "dad can we let go now??"

By the time we got down and back up hoping that they were ok, we found them sitting on the snow bank with a pile of ski equipment round them sharing a chocolate bar a passing adult had given them!!

Their first words were "that was fun can we do it again??"

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

marcellus, Shocked

but can imagine how you both felt on the way back up not knowing they were ok and sitting there enjoying someone's Milka Very Happy

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The technique I've seen - but never attempted - is for the adult to ride the button as normal with the child stood astride one of their legs. It looks precarious but seems to be effective.

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After all it is free

altis, ...the main problem is agony - mine.

Technique used for two years - one season with daughter and then one with son, was for me to be on button and then have him/her between my legs, skis inside mine (so they track between my skis) and one of their arms over the bar of the button. Works well - although have seen other come to grief through a child's ski going under theirs and tripping them up, with risk of injury to child's twisted leg - although never happened to me since eternally vigilant - aka tense and stressed throughout ride). Only problem is REALLY aching knees and back at the end of the day. I've tried the 'on one leg' but that's worse on my back and knees, though others may find it better.

But then there are T-bars...

T bars tend to be far less forgiving - more speed, less forgiving springs; neither of my two can really handle them safely yet by themselves - so I go with them, with the best technique being the bar round their lower back, just below their waist so their backs are not stressed, and the bar at my calf level, just below my knee. Result - ow my back, ow my calves, ow my arm (which is pretty strong from climbing) as my arm take the strain. Then watch the off, since one end of a T bar up a kid's jacket wreaks havoc - seen it but always avoided it...

But they've got to learn so we take it carefully and with due diligence....

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Megamum, ..this sounds exemplary - where was it?

Help!!

children, incidents and button lifts

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