Boy, 11, injured after falling about 4.5 metres from ski lift at Asessippi

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This article was published 21/03/2015 (3333 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

An 11-year-old boy suffered multiple injuries last week when he fell from a ski lift at Asessippi Ski resort, the Winnipeg Free Press confirmed Saturday.

The boy fell from the lift after he leaned over to adjust the bindings on his boots, Asessippi general manager Newell Johnston said.

“Wednesday, we had a male student fall from a ski chair,” said Johnston, who recounted the incident as he said eyewitnesses reported it to him.

 

The boy fell about 4.5 metres to the snow-covered slope and there were “multiple injuries,” Johnston said.

The incident was witnessed by a number of people, and the resort’s ski patrol was at the scene in minutes, Johnston said.

“The ski patrol administered first aid and called for an ambulance, and then they monitored him and transported him (from the slope) to the ambulance and the EMTs,” he said.

“There is a safety bar that’s on the chairs, and observers said the student was reaching down to adjust his snowboard bindings, all things I would advise against.

“When the restraining bar is in the down position, it rests between waist and chest height. You wouldn’t be able to reach your feet if the restraining bar is in place,” Johnston said.

The boy is expected to recover.

Asessippi is located nearly 400 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg in Asessippi Provincial Park. The nearest towns where medical treatment are available are Roblin, three kilometres away, and Russell, a 20-km drive.

Johnston didn’t know whether RCMP intend to review the incident, and said school officials haven’t said anything to him, either.

It’s the second incident at a Manitoba ski area this winter involving a student on a school outing.

Kelsey Brewster, a 13-year-old girl from Pilot Mound, died March 9, four days after hitting a dividing fence between novice and advanced ski runs at Holiday Mountain ski resort. Assessed as a novice, she had somehow ended up on the more difficult run.

RCMP and school officials immediately launched investigations into the fatality. There is no word on whether an inquest will be called.

In the Asessippi incident, the child did not lose consciousness, Johnston said, adding he could not confirm reports the child suffered multiple fractures, only that there were multiple injuries.

“This particular incident is unique,” the manager said, adding it hit the resort hard. “No one likes to have incidents like this occur, especially with school-age children.”

Johnston wouldn’t identify the school the boy attends or which hospital the boy was taken to.

‘No one likes to have incidents like this occur, especially with school-age children’ — Asessippi general manager Newell Johnston

School officials have yet to make any public statement.

Keith Thomas — the risk manager for the Manitoba School Boards Association, who is notified of serious incidents involving students — said he couldn’t confirm the incident.

Thomas said he has been away from his desk since Thursday at an annual trustees meeting.

“That’s something that would cross my desk on Monday,” he said.

The resort manager said he’s spoken to officials at the boy’s school but has had no update on the child’s condition.

“I don’t know if he’s home by now,” Johnston said.

He confirmed reports the boy was a student from a school with a package deal popular with a lot of local schools. It permits classes to ski or snowboard once a week for six weeks in a row.

The boy was hurt just before the chairlift was about to dock into position on top of one of the ski runs.

“We’re a valley ski slope. He was more than 75 per cent of the way up the slope when the incident occurred, near the top, probably the last 10 per cent to 15 per cent of (the way up),” Johnston said.

Johnston described the chairlift as rising about 91 metres over a span of 1,000 metres, which is the distance from the base of the chairlift to the top of the slope.

“It’s a gentle slope,” Johnston said.

alexandra.paul@freepress.mb.ca