As of 2018, there are three Snowdon lifts that run roughly parallel – a triple, quad and Poma platter. This is the triple.Lift line below the mid-station.Line above the mid-station.Leitner-Poma added an offload and tower in 2016.The mid.A buried lift line.Top vault drive.Side view of the top terminal.Last tower.View up from the base.Side view of the bottom station.Heron-Poma station.Counterweight tensioning.
First triple lift in Vermont and at Killinghton. Very long, seems like it takes forever. Can’t put my skis or snowboard on the footrests. Love how’s there’s never people on this lift. I hate the meditation because you got hike when you get off. They shouldve moved it farther uphill a couple feet and my skis and board get caught on the snow when I’m riding the midstation. They gotta fix a lot on this lift and I hate the backrests. However it does access a lot of terrain and you get a great view of K-1 as well as Snowshed from behind
I was almost killed by the Snowden triple last January when I was working for park crew at killington. It was MLK weekend, and we only had ramshead and the triple open for thousands of people. As we were dismounting at the top, we noticed an instructor and his group destroying our top jump and talking back to our coworker, so we were trying to quickly get off the triple. I didn’t realize the lift hadn’t slowed even though we had equipment. I let my coworker get off the lift first, and when I tried to get off my metal rake jammed in the chair and it swung around the bullwheel as I was still trying to get it out. The rake and chair hit me in the head, where I immediately went to patrol at the top of the mountain. They sent me back to work with a bandaid, and I boarded back to work. I went to my boss and he told me to go back to the locker room, we filled out a report, and I went home. After 6 weeks of me asking for imaging and prescription pills not working, I went to the ER. We found a massive, bleeding brain tumor on my brain stem, and I had emergency surgery in NYC in April. Since then, I tried going back, but was told directly and indirectly I got my brain surgery “optionally” and “on a whim”. I was also told the difference in lifts (between the Snowden six bubble and the Snowden triple) did not matter and “is a moot point”. By the grace of god I am alright now, but had this happened in a slightly slightly different way, or if the person it happened to didn’t have the connections I fortunately did, the injured person would have no recourse.
I have tons and tons of questions about this all, but specifically with the lift, I’m wondering if anyone has had any similar experiences? Where the bullwheel swings too quickly at the top hitting you in the head? Also, would anyone agree that the triple (built in the 70’s) is similar to the six pack bubble chair?
Hope to get some responses…. My only hope is to make sure what happened to me doesn’t happen to anyone else ever again. Had it happened quarter of a second earlier, it would’ve shattered my teeth/mouth. Had it happened quarter of a second later, my nose gets shoved up into my brain. In either case, the fact I had a brain tumor doesn’t matter however the safety aspect is just as critical. Thanks for reading! If anyone wants to reach out feel free to comment an email or phone # I’d love to chat with people that are more knowledgeable and experienced with lifts then I. I was on lift ops for half a year at killington but other than that have no lift experience.
The offloading speed on the new detachable bubble chair is probably less than half than the speed of the old triple, not really similar in that sense (200 ft/min compared to 450 ft/m). Glad you are ok.
I was the top lift operator that day you got hit in the face by your rake and I remember that incident very clearly. You slid the back end of your rake through the vertical slots in the backrest of the triple chair and did not remove it before unloading the chair. All other park crew pull the rakes out from the backrest before unloading the chair but that is not a recommended way of riding with tools (probably something your bosses should have a safety procedure on). When you left the rake in the slots the chair turned around the bullwheel and caught the handle of the rake changing its direction and slapping you in the face. The slow and stop button had already been pressed at that time but lift stopping distance on that lift is around 20 feet (measured every morning) so there was no chance of the lift stopping in time. Sorry you got hurt and had a serious medical issue found due to checking out your injury but the way you got wrecked is no different from random weekend skiers failing to ride the chair properly. Like I wrote before, most park crew kids ride the lift with tools in the same fashion as you did that day but never have I seen a park employee fail to remove the rake from the back of the chair and get clocked like you did. The triple chair and the bubble are 2 completely different lifts that work in vastly different ways. Completely user error from a seasoned lifty point of view and I did literally all I could to save you from that incident bud.
Lift Blog 
Here’s the lower lift line before the infill tower was added:
And after:
Here’s Tower 12 before the midstation was put in:
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Has Heron/Heron-Poma used this style of towers anywhere else?
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this list has 194 chairs
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First triple lift in Vermont and at Killinghton. Very long, seems like it takes forever. Can’t put my skis or snowboard on the footrests. Love how’s there’s never people on this lift. I hate the meditation because you got hike when you get off. They shouldve moved it farther uphill a couple feet and my skis and board get caught on the snow when I’m riding the midstation. They gotta fix a lot on this lift and I hate the backrests. However it does access a lot of terrain and you get a great view of K-1 as well as Snowshed from behind
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I was almost killed by the Snowden triple last January when I was working for park crew at killington. It was MLK weekend, and we only had ramshead and the triple open for thousands of people. As we were dismounting at the top, we noticed an instructor and his group destroying our top jump and talking back to our coworker, so we were trying to quickly get off the triple. I didn’t realize the lift hadn’t slowed even though we had equipment. I let my coworker get off the lift first, and when I tried to get off my metal rake jammed in the chair and it swung around the bullwheel as I was still trying to get it out. The rake and chair hit me in the head, where I immediately went to patrol at the top of the mountain. They sent me back to work with a bandaid, and I boarded back to work. I went to my boss and he told me to go back to the locker room, we filled out a report, and I went home. After 6 weeks of me asking for imaging and prescription pills not working, I went to the ER. We found a massive, bleeding brain tumor on my brain stem, and I had emergency surgery in NYC in April. Since then, I tried going back, but was told directly and indirectly I got my brain surgery “optionally” and “on a whim”. I was also told the difference in lifts (between the Snowden six bubble and the Snowden triple) did not matter and “is a moot point”. By the grace of god I am alright now, but had this happened in a slightly slightly different way, or if the person it happened to didn’t have the connections I fortunately did, the injured person would have no recourse.
I have tons and tons of questions about this all, but specifically with the lift, I’m wondering if anyone has had any similar experiences? Where the bullwheel swings too quickly at the top hitting you in the head? Also, would anyone agree that the triple (built in the 70’s) is similar to the six pack bubble chair?
Hope to get some responses…. My only hope is to make sure what happened to me doesn’t happen to anyone else ever again. Had it happened quarter of a second earlier, it would’ve shattered my teeth/mouth. Had it happened quarter of a second later, my nose gets shoved up into my brain. In either case, the fact I had a brain tumor doesn’t matter however the safety aspect is just as critical. Thanks for reading! If anyone wants to reach out feel free to comment an email or phone # I’d love to chat with people that are more knowledgeable and experienced with lifts then I. I was on lift ops for half a year at killington but other than that have no lift experience.
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The offloading speed on the new detachable bubble chair is probably less than half than the speed of the old triple, not really similar in that sense (200 ft/min compared to 450 ft/m). Glad you are ok.
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The chairs are also not on the bullwheel when they go around the terminal since they are detached from the haul rope.
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I was the top lift operator that day you got hit in the face by your rake and I remember that incident very clearly. You slid the back end of your rake through the vertical slots in the backrest of the triple chair and did not remove it before unloading the chair. All other park crew pull the rakes out from the backrest before unloading the chair but that is not a recommended way of riding with tools (probably something your bosses should have a safety procedure on). When you left the rake in the slots the chair turned around the bullwheel and caught the handle of the rake changing its direction and slapping you in the face. The slow and stop button had already been pressed at that time but lift stopping distance on that lift is around 20 feet (measured every morning) so there was no chance of the lift stopping in time. Sorry you got hurt and had a serious medical issue found due to checking out your injury but the way you got wrecked is no different from random weekend skiers failing to ride the chair properly. Like I wrote before, most park crew kids ride the lift with tools in the same fashion as you did that day but never have I seen a park employee fail to remove the rake from the back of the chair and get clocked like you did. The triple chair and the bubble are 2 completely different lifts that work in vastly different ways. Completely user error from a seasoned lifty point of view and I did literally all I could to save you from that incident bud.
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