A teenage girl was taken to hospital after dropping more than 30 feet from a chair lift at California’s highest ski resort – despite landing in a net held by resort staff.
Shocking video shows onlookers gasping in horror as the 16-year-old dangles and then falls from the Stump Alley Express chair at Mammoth Mountain on Saturday.
The lift had been halted and volunteers joined staff in holding a ‘deceleration net’ under the girl in a bid to break her fall.
The resort said the girl had not been sitting correctly as the lift set off and began ‘sliding off’ the chair, but the incident has sparked fury among skiers who have accused lift operators of not paying attention.
Pictures taken by as skier in the next chair show the teenager dangling helplessly
Seconds later she plunges more than 30 feet towards the helpers underneath
They catch her in a ‘deceleration net’ which is intended to reduce but not remove the force of the impact
‘My father and friend saw the girl unseated and immediately yelled stop, but it took the lift operator almost a minute until he stopped it when the lift was already about three stories high,’ a a relative of two men who were on the lift with the girl wrote on Instagram.
‘Lift operator completely to blame.’
The resort on the edge of the Sierra Nevada is enjoying a busy season after heavy snowfall in the last month.
The lift is one of 25 serving the 3,500 acre site which receives 400 inches of snow on average each year.
‘As the chair began its ascent, the guest, who for unknown reasons was not completely seated, began sliding off the chair,’ Mammoth Mountain said in a statement.
‘The other individuals on the chair grabbed hold of the guest and held her from falling as lift operators stopped the lift.
‘Five Mammoth Mountain employees and eight guests immediately responded and positioned the deceleration net under the guest.
‘When the guest slipped from the grasp of her chair mates, the net decelerated her fall, but did not stop it.
‘The guest was transported to Mammoth Hospital for evaluation.
‘Our thoughts are with the guest and her family.’
While KTLA reports that the young woman did have her fall broken by the net, a skier who was in the next chair and captured the incident on film blamed the resort, insisting they did not actually catch her.
‘The ski patrol failed this girl today, totally missing catching her with the net after convincing her everything was okay!!’ lunar rock maxx wrote on Instagram.
‘Telling her Just to jump already I heard the ski patrol say they’ve never done this before and was way under experienced for this situation!
‘Mammoth needs to do better!!’
‘I worked as a liftie in mammoth and you are directed to keep the safety net there and to try and catch them,’ wrote taylor w1 in response.
‘You will most likely never be able to catch someone falling by holding a net.
‘You sign a waiver when you get your tickets that you are reliable and know of the dangers. ski patrol did everything right, the woman didn’t.’
Three ski patrol members died on duty at the resort in April 2006 when a volcanic fumarole caused a snow bridge to collapse under them.
Last year ski lifts were running until July because of continued snow at the 8,000 foot resort which was opened in 1953.