This week’s topic in the #52Ancestors Challenge is “gone too soon.” But that is a painful topic, so I thought I would tell you about Dee’s miraculous survival in 1977.
Just Another Morning
One Saturday morning, Dee woke up at Stevens Pass and decided to start the morning on a double black diamond (expert) ski run called Seventh Heaven. We met up with two of our friends who were on the Ski Patrol.
Dee was 16, I was 17, and our two male friends were freshmen in college. We had been skiing together for about four years. Most of those our age who were regularly on the mountain were racers. Although Dee and I had training in racing, we didn’t like the stress of competition.
Dee and I were ski instructors for the Elks Ski School, where we had begun lessons about 7 or 8 years before. By this Saturday morning, we had over 2100 hours of skiing experience, each on this mountain. Fortunately, it was a free day, so we had no classes to teach.
Death on Seventh Heaven
Our two friends were unusually distraught when we met them Saturday morning. They explained that they had worked on the mountain during the week. A woman had slid off one of Seventh Heaven’s faces and fallen over 50 feet to her death. Our friends had to climb down and bring the body out. The cause of death was the icy conditions on Seventh Heaven.
Seventh Heaven – Open or Closed
Our friends were reluctant to go up to Seventh Heaven for the first time after they took the body off. But they were assigned to assess the ice danger on Seventh Heaven that morning. Another pair of Ski Patrollers had been up earlier and reluctantly allowed the run to be opened, but they wanted another set to test again.
Dee told them she was determined to go to Seventh Heaven that morning. The two ski patrollers wrangled with her over her plan. But they knew her well enough to know that nothing would stop her once she decided to do something.
Up We Went
So we went with our friends on the ski lift for Seventh Heaven. The men pointed out where they had hiked to bring the dead woman out, ensuring we understood the danger.
Analyzing the Run
All four of us knew every inch of that run. So at the top of the hill, we discussed all our options for skiing down. We knew that the face where the woman had slid off the cliff was the most dangerous part of the run. We had all skied that hundreds, if not thousands of times.
We decided to ski each face one person at a time and discuss the conditions of each face when we all arrived at the bottom of the face. It was icy. We arrived at the top of the most dangerous face and looked down.
Launch Into Danger
While discussing the best path through the prominent moguls of solid ice, Dee just launched herself off the edge and down the face. She made a couple of turns and then caught the edge of one ski on the ice. Down she went, sliding headfirst towards the cliff.
There was nothing we could do to help other than pray.
She dug in her elbows, knees, poles, and skis any way she could, but she kept sliding down the ice. Due to the speed she was traveling and the short distance left before the cliff, we didn’t think she could stop before the cliff. But she did! She had less than a foot to spare.
Amazing Survival
Then the three of us flew down the hill to check on her. While we were terrified, Dee was mostly furious at herself for falling. Our friends went into ski patrol mode and started to go through their routine assessing potential injuries. Dee just wanted to get up and get going. I remember yelling at her just to let them do their job. Other than bruises, she was fine.
Dee wanted to go down the rest of the way and ski Seventh Heaven again! The rest of us were out of breath and energy and needed time to recover. She said she was going again even if we didn’t go with her.
Our mom didn’t allow Dee or me to rest except at lunch and dinner. And if we stopped at the lodge for a rest or hot chocolate, she always found out. Dee was more afraid of Mom finding out we took a rest than dying on the mountain.
Ski Patrol Hut
Our friends needed mental and physical time out but were afraid to leave Dee. They had to report the conditions on Seventh Heaven to their boss, so they asked us to wait outside while they did that. No one was allowed in the Ski Patrol building except the Ski Patrol and the injured.
The men explained what had happened and that the Ski Patrol Building was the only place they could keep Dee safe while they were recuperating. So their boss closed Seventh Heaven and allowed us in the building for about 45 minutes of rest and hot chocolate.
Secret Survival
When we saw our parents later, they told us that they had heard that Seventh Heaven had been closed because of a near-fatal accident. They wanted to know if we knew what had happened. We distracted them by telling them about the woman who died during the week and didn’t answer their question.
Our parents never knew that Dee was the “near-fatal accident” that was given as the reason for closing Seventh Heaven that morning.
