 Poster: A snowHead
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Just picked this up from an Austrian press article:
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Jail for skier who injured child
Austrian officials have signalled a get tough attitude on people who ski too fast. They jailed a 37-year-old man for four months - and fined him 1,800 Euros.He had smashed into a five-year-old boy on the ski slopes.
The accident on a piste at the Hochrindl resort in Carinthia at Christmas last year left the boy seriously ill in hospital with head injuries. The court heard that the boy is now on the mend.
The builder, a baumeister from Graz in southern Austria, said the boy had not followed the rules, but the court rejected the defence and the man was convicted of causing negligent injury after he failed to avoid the child. The court heard he had been going too fast and had hit the boy at full speed shortly after making a small jump on the run.
The child suffered a serious head injury and spent several days in a coma as he fought for his life.
The prosecutor said that the man was not following the proper skiing regulations. This states Skiers should always give way to those in front of them and make sure they are in control at all times.
When he was arrested the man said that he had been devastated by what he had done and that he was a father-of-two himself. Although he was fined the court heard he had already voluntarily paid £8,000 in compensation to the family of the injured boy.
The court had the option of imposing a sentence of up to two years but opted for a shorter sentence because of the skiiers obvious remorse.
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So, they're getting tough. Good.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Bode Swiller, agreed. I Love Austria (obviously) but it's the only place I've been taken out or had such near misses
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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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holidayloverxx, trust me, it happens in equal measure just about everywhere. Need a few more banged up and publicised and then people might act more responsibly (actually, scrub that, I doubt anything will change).
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Had it happen to me once, if I'd were a smaller (lighter) person it might have done me a lot of damage, fortunately the idiot concerned in my case glanced off my shoulder and then proceeded to cartwheel down the remainder of the slope, I have no sympathy for out of control skiers going too fast for their ability or for the type of piste
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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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Need a few more banged up and publicised
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Certainly, BUT the TO's aren't going to want to advertise come on holiday with us, by the way you may get banged up in prison.
Perhaps the ski insurance companies could publicise the skiers code and the prison sentence, after all they (we) end up paying out.
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This is certainly a positive thing for snow safety.
I do appreciate the 'reality' of the amounts fined and given away.... why?... I think Austria is very cautious of the 'where there's blame there's a claim' culture.
Makes the fines and punishment actually mean something rather than an automated payout process.
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Could resorts not take some responsibility - if one any given day riding chairlifts and skiing the odd piste I can spot a number of people skiing too fast for their ability or pulling out blind surely a uniformed patroller could hand out a fair number of educational warnings? I'm pretty convinced that as far as responsibility code goes most people might know downhill skier has right of way and nothing else (and IMV this is deeply flawed in isolation as it should work like traffic rules i.e. if you enter from a junction or from parked you don't have right of way).
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| fatbob wrote: |
| Could resorts not take some responsibility - if one any given day riding chairlifts and skiing the odd piste I can spot a number of people skiing too fast for their ability or pulling out blind surely a uniformed patroller could hand out a fair number of educational warnings? I'm pretty convinced that as far as responsibility code goes most people might know downhill skier has right of way and nothing else (and IMV this is deeply flawed in isolation as it should work like traffic rules i.e. if you enter from a junction or from parked you don't have right of way). |
I agree. A few years back I was aiming to pass a stationary skier by a good 5m when he pushed his (unseen by me) very small kid into a traverse right in my direction without even looking.
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Great thing! Now if they would only be at least half as strict with those guys from Kaprun, who managed to kill 155 people, and walked away without any blaim. 
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Great news - wish they did the same in Wengen - skiers hammering into air over blind crest - what if someone had fallen below - no thought for others.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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A few years back in Selva, an older local came flying over a ridge on Dantercepies. My son was about 9/10 at the time, he and I were tightish to the edge of the piste and clearly visible from upslope. The guy realised that he was heading for my son whilst in the air and started to flap, he clipped Joseph on the way through and crashed on landing, leaving kit all over the slope. His pals arrived and started putting him back together. Joseph was concerned for his welfare and wanted to help, I opted to leave it to his friends rather than risk me adding verbal insult to injury. Another foot to the right and my lad could've been in a helicopter. 
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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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fatbob, the Fis code includes exactly that..
"5. Entering, starting and moving upwards.
A skier or snowboarder entering a marked run, starting again after stopping or moving upwards on the slopes must look up and down the slopes that he can do so without endangering himself or others."
When teaching traverse it is so important to drum this into students, not only look up before you go but halfway along the traverse when the carve starts you must ensure that it is safe to continue.
So, it does work like traffic rules and they are as equally ignored.
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| flangesax wrote: |
fatbob, the Fis code includes exactly that..
"5. Entering, starting and moving upwards.
A skier or snowboarder entering a marked run, starting again after stopping or moving upwards on the slopes must look up and down the slopes that he can do so without endangering himself or others."
When teaching traverse it is so important to drum this into students, not only look up before you go but halfway along the traverse when the carve starts you must ensure that it is safe to continue.
So, it does work like traffic rules and they are as equally ignored. |
The gent makes the point that the rule is there, but wonders if people are aware of it.
Put your average punter on a pair of skis and their IQ reduces by about 30% (70% for boarders).
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You know it makes sense.
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countryman, problem in Wengen is that there are no policemen in the village, to be fair to the Swiss if you are the cause of an accident on the slopes and are caught chances are pretty high they will prosecute, Switzerland after all will fine pedestrians for crossing the road in the wrong place
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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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D G Orf,
I had a machine pistol brandished at me for that very offence
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Poster: A snowHead
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Bode Swiller, ....I agree with 'they are getting tough...good' (see pugilism on the piste from earlier this year) but I feel ambivalent about over regulation - ie the mountain feeling oppressive - I'd like people to be taken aside and told 'don't ski like a prat or we'll take your lift pass away' but I wouldn't like powers of arrest being exercised all the time. Climbing is pretty much self regulating and that's a good thing IMHO - when people behave like idiots they get told, simply and quickly - but this is different from very crowded ski slopes - I went to see friends in the 3V for a couple of days and this idiot Italian (shiny black puffa jacket, six foot three and long dark hair) nearly hit me three times on the same run down to Meribel centre, despite me trying to avoid him; every time I thought I'd lost him he managed to blast past or reappear jumping off something and onto to the piste - the equivalent idiocy in climbing would result in a Darwin Award - I would have appreciated a pisteur taking such a twit to one side, since he was behaving consistently dangerously and it was clearly his constant modus operandii - a real danger to others.
I'm not sure about the comment re Swiss prosecuting - there's a quite predominant view in the judiciary that if foreigners are busy clouting each other that's their own problem, and we'll not waste our time on them - maybe right, maybe wrong, but that's the view I have experienced in the Valais, where we are. Swiss tend to be law-abiding rather than litigious in an American way - ie a law abiding culture rather than an overtly oppressive legal system.
Overall, I'd like to see more lift passes confiscated and no increase in prosecutions, except where injury is involved.
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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 wrote: |
| countryman, problem in Wengen is that there are no policemen in the village, |
lmao .. so who are the ladies' front bottoms running law and order?
Only problem with Wengen is its history, the Brits and those poor souls who still think its a Big Deal .. cos its slopes are ordinary for 99.9% of us
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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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I was under the impression that the "give way to skiers in front" rule trumped most if not all of the others. As seems to have been the case here.
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| snowball wrote: |
| I was under the impression that the "give way to skiers in front" rule trumped most if not all of the others. As seems to have been the case here. |
I know lots of people seem to believe this when its been debated here before but logically it makes no sense - take a crowded homerun at the end of the day - it's hard enough to navigate all the moving persons, if you add in a need to give everyone who has stopped or might join the run a wide berth as well you might as well download (which I'll often choose to do anyway if there isn't an interesting alternative). If you stop you've taken yourself out of the traffic flow & the obligation is on you to rejoin safely. Something like this seems to be alluded to in the defence in this case, and it's slightly concerning if the precedent being set is adults are always in the wrong when it comes to accidents with kids. Not that this defends tools who ski like nutcases where there are lots of kids and/or beginners around.
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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, there's a policeman who lives in Wengen and returns there each night (at least there used to be) but I think the nearest station house is Lauterbrunnen, the slopes are pretty much run by the pisteurs, the village has a group of people (who we call the noise police) that have some sort of authority, they patrol at night to make sure no one is singing in the streets or otherwise disturbing the sleep of the guests in the hotels, they also I think act as the fire brigade and emergency services if required.
However as someone local once said to me, if you commit a serious crime in Wengen you are not going to get away with it simply because it takes an age to get from Wengen to anywhere else, they do get petty crime in the village from time to time, usually if there are large numbers of Russians staying (fortunately not common) but the crimes are usually breaking and entering into hotels or bars and stealing everything they can sell at home from computer screens down to spectacles 
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Something like this seems to be alluded to in the defence in this case
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Let's not forget that we really know nothing about the details of this case, the exact location, etc.. etc.. so we can but hypothesize in a vegatarian way (ie... with no meat).
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I have only been in a collision once... also in Austria. I think it's fair locking people up when injury is caused, after all you can get convicted for doing the same to someone in a car, but like other people say I think there needs to be more on-slope enforcement like lift pass removal.
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| flangesax wrote: |
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Something like this seems to be alluded to in the defence in this case
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Let's not forget that we really know nothing about the details of this case, the exact location, etc.. etc.. so we can but hypothesize in a vegatarian way (ie... with no meat). |
Yes I know but for debate's sake I'm working on a hypothetical that the guy was not 100% in the wrong. I've seen potentially quite nasty accidents averted only through the skill of the adult skier/boarder when they've involved kids not following the FIS rules or being under adequate adult supervision. Worst case was a 6 year oldish who'd ducked ropes skied into a terrain park and sat down under a big kicker. Boarder coming down couldn't see him and park was otherwise empty - only narrowly missed board to kid contact by taking a nasty bail. Dad then arrived on scene and starting bawling boarder out - totally not his fault and was in fact quite shaken up by the miss before Dad waded in.
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and sat down under a big kicker
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if you substitute that for "injured skier was lying under a big kicker" then most would probably blame the boarder if he came down and landed on the injured guy.
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fatbob, totally agree with your points. The fact is that a different set of rules apply in terrain parks. The downhill skier does not always have priority even if they are not stationary. FFS so many times you will have some little kid appear outside your line of sight when you have priority and are approaching a feature. It is a joke.
Bode Swiller, yes but what is your point? In my experience people tend to watch out for each other and wont drop unless the landing is clear but of course there are a few exceptions and accidents do happen. More trouble is caused by oblivious skiers(including parents + children) snaking and cutting in and out of features whilst being totally unaware to whats going on around them.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| Elston wrote: |
| Bode Swiller, yes but what is your point? In my experience people tend to watch out for each other and wont drop unless the landing is clear... |
That IS my point.
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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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Bode Swiller, Yeah I get it and the basic principle of having a spotter is terrain park code of conduct to avoid precisely such circumstances. However in the case I'm referring to to it doesn't absolve the kid (& by proxy dad) of culpability - if an injured skier is lying beneath a blkind kicker for any length of time and should be there they are probably also unconcious as a) by the same code of conduct they shouldn't be alone and b) they should be aware of the risk and alerting other users by shouting that the landing isn't clear. Probably the terrain park layout was also at fault in this case as the landing wasn't scopable from any angle above.
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fatbob, I don't think we can blame a 6 year old kid for not realising that it was an unsafe place to stop. The parent, on the other hand, was a total numpty. However, if I'm sitting there as the judge, it would have been the jumper's fault if they had collided despite the idiotic actions of that parent.
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You know it makes sense.
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| Bode Swiller wrote: |
| fatbob, I don't think we can blame a 6 year old kid for not realising that it was an unsafe place to stop. The parent, on the other hand, was a total numpty. However, if I'm sitting there as the judge, it would have been the jumper's fault if they had collided despite the idiotic actions of that parent. |
I think we agree then that courts may be more likely to give benefit of doubt to kids/injured parties despite there being breaches of "good conduct" or rules by all parties which was the original point I was exploring. Without drawing diagrams of a 12 year old incident and recreating contemporaneous testimony I'm clearly not going to sway Judge Swiller.
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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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fatbob, I can be bought for cash though.
The jumper didn't make sure his landing was clear. However that came about, his fault.
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Poster: A snowHead
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The jumper didn't make sure his landing was clear. However that came about, his fault.
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Quite a hard line to take - it takes two people to have an accident and only one person to avoid it. If there is an empty snow park, and you've been watching the jump for a while and no one has dropped in then surely you wouldn't actually go down and then hike all the way back up just to double check there wasn't an injured skier and/or numpty sitting below the jump?
If you seriously are that cautions (then hats of to you for being so responsible) then it must make skiing quite an arduous process, what with all the stopping and hiking.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| Bode Swiller wrote: |
The jumper didn't make sure his landing was clear. However that came about, his fault. |
& where in the law or guidance does this say this trumps "do not stop or sit where you cannot be seen", "obey closures" etc etc?
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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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kat.ryb, terrain parks ain't my thang so all that sitting around comparing tongue studs hasn't entered my life.
As to how people make sure their landing area is clear really isn't my problem either - normally you'd be with a few mates so all your hiking/stopping nonsense is unnecessary. I'm just arguing that, from the point of view of who would be at fault, it would be the jumper.
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fatbob, not sure what trumps what but you said about the boarder:
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totally not his fault
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and I'm arguing that can't be.
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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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well hopefully a message will get across to those who do go too fast on pistes. it also alarms me how many boarders/skiers you see on a piste that is too advanced for their ability.
Last edited by Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do. on Mon 11-06-12 15:05; edited 1 time in total
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Please realise people that the landing might have been clear when the guy called his drop in. It might not be his fault if out of sight some kid ducks a rope and cuts straight across the landing while the guy might be either actually: on the jump or in the air!
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Jumping without a spotter is indefensible and shows lack of knowledge by people of high end skiing/boarding skills- which are also probably responsible for the majority of near misses and accidents. But as a guy said to a highly qualified trainer friend when he gave us a mouthful of filth for standing in the piste markers he was slaloming around and was chased down the mountain "There aint no rules for boarders mate"
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This is a terrain park sign from the USA:
Seems pretty clear to me. What are the signs like in, say, France? Not that a sign should make any difference.
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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.
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Sorry I withdraw the "totally not his fault" if it helps end the diversion. Believe it or not I thought of adding an element on wisdom of using spotters into the original point but left it out for reasons of concision 
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reasons of concision
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concision is what might happen to you if you land on your head....
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