#skiing-trip-fatality

#skiing-trip-fatality

"Our ops teams have been working magic all winter long, but even that magic can't really fight back what Mother Nature has delivered at the tail end of this season for us."

The state fined Mammoth Mountain Ski Area LLC $26,810 for three violations related to the death, according to a July 2025 citation that is being reported here for the first time. The violations included not ensuring the patrollers were able to deploy avalanche airbags prior to the 25-year-old's death.

The new shuttle will operate on a first-come, first-served basis, providing convenient access to Kirkwood for skiers and snowboarders.

"As we wrap up the season, I want to thank our loyal guests who showed up smiling day in and day out to support their local hill. I also want to thank our dedicated staff whose immense efforts and pride in their work kept Eldora running all season long. We hope everyone comes to celebrate the season with us this weekend." - Andrew Gast, Eldora's president and general manager.

The skier, who has not been identified, was attempting a run called Dropout 2 - among the steepest marked trails in California - which descends from the summit ridge of the 11,000-foot mountain. The run falls about 1,200 vertical feet below a slow, three-person lift that ferries expert skiers to some of Mammoth's most adventurous terrain.

Runaway snowboards were a cause of great concern in the early days of snowboarding as snowboards don't have breaks like skis. This concern was justified in many ways as proto snowboard bindings much less secure and reliable than modern systems using simple straps, rubber components, or basic buckles that could loosen or fail more easily during a crash.

A skier was killed in an avalanche in the Boss Basin area near Vail Pass in Colorado's backcountry, marking the first avalanche fatality of the 2025-26 winter season in the state. According to the Colorado Avalanche Information Center (CAIC), the skier was reported missing on Saturday evening, March 7.

When skier Michael Harris found himself buried under an avalanche at Stevens Pass in Washington, he more or less accepted his fate, understanding that as he was skiing alone, the potential for rescue was slim. However thanks to Apple's Find My iPhone, Harris' was able to see that he hadn't moved for hours and contacted the Stevens Pass ski patrol for assistance.

Ski patrol has a serious job to do, ensuring everyone stays safe on the mountain through terrain control, avalanche mitigation, and general safety checks. In general, most ski patrollers are hard working, great people who want to keep everything moving smoothly on the mountain, but you do, on rare occasions, encounter "power tripping" ski patrollers who seems to blow everything out of proportion.

Genuinely feel bad for everyone involved in this multi person t-bar crash at Kreischberg Ski Resort in Austria. Of course no one wants to get decked by a snowboarder sliding out of control down a steep icy slope but its not hard to sympathize with the snowboarder who had little to no chance of self-arresting after losing his footing given the terrain and the fact that he had one boot unstrapped.

The terrain park operates on different rules and guidelines than the rest of the ski resort. While the downhill skier always has the right of way on the rest of the mountain, skiers and snowboarders are responsible for clearing out of any landing zone as soon as they can. Hanging out in the landing zone or allowing your child to hang out in the landing zone, as we see in the video below, is absolutely unacceptable,