Passengers on Sugarloaf's King Pine chairlift hold on for dear life, or jump off entirely, as the lift rolled backwards this Saturday. Darrell Davis photo via Bangor Daily News.
UPDATED WEDNESDAY, MARCH 25th: This Saturday, March 21st, the King Pine fixed grip quad chairlift at Sugarloaf Mountain in Maine suffered a rollback at roughly 11:30 a.m., causing the chairlift cable, and its chairs with ski area guest on them, to roll backwards the distance of nine chairs, according to the Bangor Daily News. In the video below, guests can be heard screaming and even a few jumping from the chair as skiers and riders on the ground scramble to come to the rescue. All told, 7 people were injured in the incident and a total of 203 skiers and snowboarders had to be evacuated from the chairlift by Sugarloaf ski patrollers, who lowered guests from the chairs with ropes and harnesses.
While the chairlift had been inspected and certified for operation by Maine's Board of Elevator and Tramway Safety this fall, and was allegedly the first rollback to happen at a ski lift at the resort, it's not Sugarloaf's first chairlift accident in recent years: on a blustery day during the 2010 Christmas holiday, the cable on the Spillway East double chair derailed and dropped several chairloads of guests 30 feet to the ground below. Eight people were injured and 150 had to be evacuated. Sugarloaf replaced that chairlift with a new quad the following year.
According to Ski Area Management Magazine, the rollback was due to mechanical failures in the King Pine chairlift:
SAM Magazine—Carrabassett Valley, Maine, March 22, 2015—Investigators from Sugarloaf working in conjunction with an engineer from the State of Maine Board of Elevators and Tramways have identified mechanical failures that led to the King Pine lift rollback, resulting in injuries to seven guests yesterday.
The investigation began shortly after the evacuation of the lift was complete. Preliminary findings revealed that the trigger for the incident was a major mechanical failure in one of two gearboxes connecting the lift's electric motor to its drive bullwheel.
The gearbox failure effectively de-coupled the bullwheel from the lift's primary service brake, which is located on the drive shaft between the two gearboxes, and its anti-reverse brake, which is the first of three redundant backup mechanisms for preventing reverse travel.
At this point, the emergency bullwheel brake, which uses calipers to apply braking pressure to the flange of the bullwheel itself, was applied by the lift attendant. This brake slowed the speed of the rollback and ultimately brought the lift to a stop. The application of the emergency brake by the lift attendant likely prevented a more extensive rollback.
The final braking mechanism, known as a drop dog (a large metal pin that drops into the bullwheel to prevent rotation), apparently failed to deploy as designed.
"The cause of the gearbox failure and the failure of the drop dog to deploy as designed both remain under investigation," Ethan Austin, Sugarloaf's director of marketing said.
Just one day before the incident, the gearbox passed a vibration test—a routine preventive maintenance procedure intended to identify potential problems. Another preventive procedure, an oil analysis test, was performed on Jan. 19. Both tests were conducted by outside contractors who specialize in gearbox analysis, and neither revealed any irregularities.
Lift mechanics routinely check gearbox oil levels as part of their daily pre-operating checklist. But the machinery inside of a lift gearbox is not easily observed, so Sugarloaf contracts for routine oil analysis and vibration tests that can indicate potential problems before they occur. The gearbox last underwent major servicing, including the replacement of worn components, just before the start of the 2011-12 winter season.
"Our first concern remains with those who were injured, and those who went through a truly frightening experience," Austin said. "Based on what we know now, we're grateful that this situation wasn't any worse."
About The Author
stash member Ryan Dunfee
Former Managing Editor at Teton Gravity Research, current Senior Contributor, current professional hippy at the Sierra Club, and avid weekend recreationalist.
Tahoe Trail
March 22nd, 2015
Backyards….auto not correct
drop22
March 22nd, 2015
My old man was the last one off that very lift before it started rolling back, so thankful for timing…
I used to live and work at Sugarloaf. This is very unfortunate and scary but everyone needs to thank the mountain for doing all they did. It is not Sugarloaf’s fault. Shit happens.
#LoaferForLife
Derby Ale
March 22nd, 2015
Was anyone injured as a course of the rollback itself, or only those dumb enough to leap?
wizard123
March 23rd, 2015
Only people who,didn’t jump were injured except for 1 person who was hurt when their chair swung so hard it hit the pillar!
jasonhenson
March 22nd, 2015
Derby Ale…. Leaping is probably the best course of action in this case. If you’ve never seen what happens in a roll back, google a video of it. Unless it was certain death to jump, I’d recommend jumping at the earliest opportunity if this ever happens. If you listen close to this Sugarloaf video you can hear all of the people in the background yelling to jump.
Derby Ale
March 22nd, 2015
You do know that the Winter Park intentional roll back test famously seen on the internet was operated intentionally without some of the standard safety features in place, and at that, the test in which the video shows chairs thrown was effectively operated without ANY of the safety features activated after they intentionally overloaded the lift beyond the designed carrying capacity.
I watched the video, and the lift was not moving faster than a normal detachable lift, and possibly not even faster than a fixed grip. The safety brakes worked about as designed, and the rollback only traveled the length of 9 chairs. And I say the people on the ground weren’t exactly lift safety specialists from the resort. Just a bunch of morons who were shouting without understanding how these things work.
So I ask again, was anyone actually injured from the rollback itself, or was it only people who chose to leap?
Full disclosure: I’ve worked with both Leitner-Poma and CTEC-Doppelmayr on power transmission components as recently as 3 years ago in a former job.
Gagwel
March 23rd, 2015
So the question should actually be: was anyone actually injured from the rollback itself, or was it only people who have watched the Winter Park test video? :)
wizard123
March 23rd, 2015
Wrong!
wizard123
March 23rd, 2015
Derby ale u r soo wrong a cpl injuries came from people who didn’t jump but the chair swung into the 1 st pole from the start of the lift… Those who jumped were not hurt.. Other than the one car that hit the pole all injuries came from the chairs whipping around the end of the lift… Mind u the video only shows the last 20 seconds when the manual brake was engaged after the emergency brake failed.. The rollback was quite fast and me And my brother were lucky we jumped! U got it wrong derby! Now in another situation u may be right but in this case u are horribly wrong! No one was hurt from jumping… Those who jumped saved themselves from injury!
wnishin
March 26th, 2015
Posting the video seems in poor taste given that people were injured.
wizard123
March 26th, 2015
I agree if my bro was hurt and this was footage of it I would be incredibly disappointed and disgusted! I Can only imagine how the family’s of the 7 injured feel!
robertsnowmaker
September 2nd, 2016
A Dozier planetary gear box would have helped this failure ..but doesn’t explain why dog tooth brake failed to deploy if service brake failed and dog tooth plus reverse stop clutch inside planetary fail that is all three brakes . there are no more