The scariest moment for a big mountain rider, skier or snowboarder is to fall right in the upper part of the mountain. All the cliffs, all the rocks, all the snow… everything is still under you. You can only pray to be lucky enough to be able to stop before you hit something really gnarly or to miraculously avoid all the hidden dangers. So this is definitely not the best time and place to loose your balance. But it can happen even to the best of them. Like in this longest ski fall nightmare featuring pro skiing veteran Ian McIntosh. While filming for the ski movie titled Paradise Waits up in Alaska Ian dropped into a line he thought he had studied thoroughly enough. But right after the start things went wrong when he fell into an unseen five foot deep trench.
“From there, my slough took over and their was no way to stop, I pulled my airbag to help prevent against any possible trauma injuries as I tumbled to the bottom,” he said.
And what a tumble it was, after loosing both of his skis while trying to stop McIntosh cartwheeled over 1,600 feet (almost 500m) in under a minute down almost vertical slope. Finally he stopped at the foot of the mountain. Deep snow and missing all the rocks helped him walk away from the incident unscratched, but still it can feel like this skier got a second chance for life. If somebody was keeping score for the longest ski fall this would have been a serious contender. Skiing steep lines like that, even with all the experience, preparation, scouting, the right skiing gear, choosing the right conditions, physical and mental preparation remains a challenge.
But of course, that is also a big par of the allure.