Training and Carelessness

Every so often a moment occurs that reminds you how important training is and how careless some people can be. Even with a job as simple as a lift operator. To break this job down to the essential bits, all you really need to do is stand outside in the cold, clean off a seat, and in some cases help people onto the moving chair. If things go wrong slow it down or stop the lift. Or at least that's what it would seem.

The part that regularly gets forgotten is the after lift portion, once the chair is leaving the berth. Outside of the exit moments, this is the chance for anything bad to happen. For example a chair can be pulled off track due to skis or boards. A rider may not be properly sitting and fall off. A ski can come off, or a lost pole.

During a recent ride, a relatively new lifty was at the chair base maintaining everything on a two person chair. He did everything right helping a mom and child onto the chair, but forgot to watch the next step. Right before complete lift off, the child slipped from the chair and the mom caught him. The lifty didn't stop the lift and the child went dangling away somehow pulled up by mom onto her lap. The child lost a ski in the process and left it at the base of the chair. Grabbing the ski as I went up, I arrived at the top to an irate mom and dad who proceeded to yell at me for the improper running of the lift.

It's hard to explain to outsides that I'm not a direct employee of the resort as an instructor, I'm more a contractor. Thus I've got no real influence or ability to change the operation at all. In this case, the irate customers really weren't interested in hearing that either, they wanted to yell at someone and I unfortunately became the object of their hatred. 10 minutes later, I explained that talking to information to get the lift manager for the day would be the best course of action and we parted ways.

I met up with a few other instructors and proceeded to get in line for the advanced terrain lift. At the top of a black diamond run filled with bumps the 6 of us took a great run down and stopped 3/4 of the way down. The bumps were mixed with powder and just exhausting after the earlier lessons. One of the instructors points to the top of the run with a look of exasperation.

Coming down the run was the father and son from my lift altercation earlier. The father, skiing the bumps, cradled his son in his arms. Yep, this guy was real worried about the safety of his son.