What was your best"OH SHIT" moment?

[phUnk]

Originally posted by bad_roo
Best day of my life.

Besides, the cat's made ths spare bed all hairy.

Damn that pussy!

[Franz Klammer]

My worst "Oh Shit" moment happened while skiing out of bounds with a couple of friends back home in Austria when I was 15. We had done the run a couple of times and it was getting late so the last descent had to go down fairly quickly. So, like on all the other runs, we jumped down a small 20 footer. Somehow I just got hurried, took way too much speed and fucked up the landing.

Before I could even realise what had happened a tree hit my right thigh and smashed it to bits (in retrospect I like that cloud look on the x-ray). I can't remember much after that but my friends still remind me what a girl I was before the helicopter arrived. Note to self: never say "I don't wanna die" unless you actually are dying.

The result: 1 titanium plate, 13 nails and 4 months on crutches plus another 2 when they removed the plate and the nails a year later.

[SponsoredByDuctTape]

Two moments come to mind:

The first was at Mammoth in the Spring of '96. I dropped into P3, made a couple of turns and started traversing toward chair 23, looking below me for the best snow as I went along. I came over the ridge from P3 going into P2 at a pretty good clip, when "Oh shit," the snow had melted to the point where I was staring at a field of basketball sized rocks about thirty feet across, every rock with a dinner plate sized chunk of snow in between. There was no way I was getting out of being completely fugged, so I jumped, trying to clear as many rocks as I could. I landed on some rocks, which instantly ejected me, spun around, landed ass first onto some other rocks, and did a couple of backward somersaults. Bruised the shit out of my back, tore an eighteen inch gash in the back of my jacket, and completely blew up one ski. When I got up, I noticed a large, head-shaped depression in the snow right next to a huge boulder. Brilliant.

The second was also at Mammoth (big surprise). In the park, I saw this sweet little eight foot high spine with a nice ramp right up the front of it. I figured I'd launch the front of the thing, steez my shit, and land on one side or the other. Everything was going great until I popped off the lip, and "FUUUUUUUUUU********," this thing was a vocano hit, not a spine. I was fifteen feet in the air staring at flat-ass ground. Slammed tips (being that I was angulating to match the downslope that, as it turns out, wasn't there), then face into the hardpack. Goggle lens popped out, and somehow I managed to snap a pole dead in half. This resulted in a concussion, losing my left toenail ala Phunk, and eventually having to have surgery on that toe because of a chronicly ingrown nail. Brilliant.

[JMO]

That icy cross-over under the tram at Snowbird on your way to Dalton's Draw. Scared the pants off me once. I thought for sure I was going to lose an edge and tomahawk over the rocks.

Got caught in a whiteout beneath Secret Chute at Blackcomb and had no idea where I was. I could see rocks all around me so I backtracked and eventually found a safe route. But I still couldn't see a thing.

[kush1]

Crash in the K-wood comp lastyear and BLT gap at the first summit

Both were well documented on the board so I don't think I'll explain anymore..

[Barnballs]

last monday, when I agreed to move in with the girlfriend.

oh shit for sure.

[Seldom Seen]

A few years ago I was trying to spin a 720 in the park at Breck. I'd never done one before, but figured that all i had to do was spin twice as fast as for a 360 and go a little bit bigger... I forgot to calculate the fact that i have a defective left shoulder that has been known to pop out of the socket sometimes. I hit the lip and hucked a spin as hard as i could... right away i heard a "POP" and i felt what had happened. The spin got stalled and i was 25 feet off of the ground, backwards, with my shoulder out of the socket. Yup you guessed it: "OHHHHH SHIIITTTTTTT".
I crashed pretty hard and my shoulder popped back in upon being slammed on the ground. All my friends were asking what the hell happened in the middle of the spin, but no one believed that my shoulder popped out.

On a trip to Fernie on year, with my brand new marker bindings that the shop guy told me were "the best you can buy" (i didnt know any better). Tons of snow, skiing down some chute above a pretty big cliff band. Turned hard and my right binding released, sending me sliding down the steep slope towards the rocks and cliff. "OHHHH SHIIIIIITTTT". I was barely able to stop myself and ended up coming to a stop right on the edge of the cliff.
Thanks Marker!!! On a good note, i went back to the shop that sold me those pieces of shite and told him the story. He immediately gave me a new pair of Solomon 914s in return for the markers. Pretty cool customer service.

[powder11]

last monday, when I agreed to move in with the girlfriend.

oh shit for sure.

thats was an oh shit for me too, way scarier than anything ive done on skis. as far as ski related stuff, the 1st oh shit I got was my 1st big mtn exp at solitude back in college. I was skiing these big ass 210 gs skis in deep pow off the quad into honeycomb, caught an edge and started tumbling down. my skis got caught between two trees perpendicular to the slope. my bindings were cranked up for racing and I stopped dead in my tracks hanging upside down from my skis with all sorts of slough billowing over my face. after the thoughts of drowning in snow passed I struggled feverishly to somehow get out of the bindings. being upside down meant blood rushed to my head and i soon ran out of strength to struggle. thats when the "oh shit" im going to die and they will find me here in the spring. luckily my buddy came by and found me. he thought it was hysterical.

edit: props to saloman for keepin me in, prolly the only time ever skiing I wished I had markers

[Pedro]

Right about when my boots came out of my bindings, (See avatar)

[Alyeska_Skibum]

1) I'm about to jump off the cornice up at Tin Can with my buddy about 2 seconds behind me, when all of the sudden, the damned thing breaks loose. Somehow or another, I managed to stop and frantically warn my buddy. The entire south face slid right then. We would've been right in the middle of that shit.
We just bought beacons about a week before, and like morons, we thought we were invincible if we were wearing them.

2) Crashing my car into the rocks on the Seward highway at 40mph. I was the only one bucked up and the only one that got hurt (broken nose on the steering wheel)
There was a whole train of people headed up there, somebody called the ambulance. Friends thought I was crazy when I told the paramedics that I didnt want to go to the hospital. There was 14 inches fresh to be had.

[Telegasm]

My worst was: Hanging by four fingers, 500 feet off the deck.

June 21, 2003, I was solo climbing in the Minarets (the range of rocky pinnacles you see a couple miles away in the western background of photos from Mammoth Mountain). I was working my way along a continuous ridge line, summitting all the high points along the way. I topped out on this one pinnacle by a series of pretty tough moves, and found no way off of it. In every direction the climbing turned to super hard stuff that I couldn't attempt unroped. So naturally I returned to where I had climbed up, to go back down the way I came.

When I went to drop down the way I came up, a foothold gave way, releasing a 1,500 pound rock (small refrigerator size) that fell soundlessly through the air for 25 feet before hammering a ledge and breaking into hundreds of pieces that fell another uninterrupted 300 feet to the glacier below, landing with snow explosions and hissing noises as the pieces rode down the glacier.

So now I was stuck on top of this pinnacle with my original ascent route destroyed (where the fallen rock used to be, there was now a vertical dirt scar, flaky and unclimbable). And I had already looked around and found no other way off. A freak early-summer snowstorm was coming in: clouds were already beginning to appear below me, snaking between the Minarets like ghostly fingers. Clouds had already snuffed the sun and the temperature was free falling past 40. I had all of my clothes on already. I'd be damned if I was going to try to spend the night atop this forsaken needle of rock while it snowed on me. I had to find a way down.

There was just one face of the pinnacle where I hadn't yet searched for an escape route. That was because instead of 400 feet high on the other sides, this one side was 600 feet high and nearly overhanging. A dark chimney split this face of rock, and it was the only feature I'd seen that offered some hope of a continous route all the way down to the ground.. There was no way into the chimney from above (it was capped by overhangs) but if I could survive a sketchy traverse diagonally down into it, there might be hope. Still, the chimney itself twisted downward out of sight beyond an overhang. For all I knew it might get me 400 feet down and then leave me hanging in space 200 feet above the talus. But it was the only thing left to try.

First, it was difficult to get anywhere near the chimney from the top of the spire. In short, I was climbing unroped, on holds the size of match boxes, while 30 feet below me the rock pitched past vertical for a 550 foot drop to a boulder field.

After what seemed like a million heart beats I was in a place from where I could almost reach sideways to the chimney; but the last line of good handholds and footholds came to a halt before I could make it all the way there. I considered actually jumping through the air to land in the chimney, trying to wedge myself between its walls when I landed, but the chances didn't seem too good.

The chimney was basically two cliff walls spread about 30 inches apart from each other, located at the back of a larger crevice like a wedge-shaped elevator shaft, open to the air on one side, almost vertical, and the whole thing twisted and spiraled out of sight as it plunged hundreds of feet below.

I had a few feet left to reach the chimney, but there just weren't enough holds to do it smoothly. I was totally without safety or backup. Every time one of my feet dropped a pebble, it accelerated below for many soundless seconds before bouncing off the walls of the shaft far below me and then shattering into oblivion somewhere that I couldn't see.

With the lack of good holds, I was going to have to do a "match" move, where one of my hands would briefly share a hold with the other hand, while the feet plastered themselves on imperfect sloping ledges below as best they could, for a split second. Then my right hand could reach about five feet out to the right and make it to the near edge of the chimney.

And here's the OH SHIT moment. As I attempted the match-hands move, BOTH of my feet peeled off the slick and sloping spots they clung to. I dropped, almost blacking out in fear, catching myself by only four finger tips. For what must have been the longest second and a half of my life I actually said to myself "OH FUCK, I'M GOING TO DIE." It all flashed before me and I realized I had already signed my own warrant. Then somehow I did a 4-fingertip pull-up, which on any ordinary day I could not do if you offered me $100 for it. This gave me just enough time to launch my petrified ass to the right and wedge myself into the chimney.

That alone was pretty fucking surreal, and I wish that was the end. How I wish that was the end! Now I had accomplished maybe 100 feet of the 600 foot descent I needed to pull out of thin air to save my life. Now to descend the chimney, of which I could only see the first half or so. As I descended, wedging various body parts between the rock walls, sometimes the shaft grew tight enough to almost spit me out, and other times it threatened to grow wide enough that I could not span from wall to wall with my full armspan.

About 150 feet below where I entered the chimney, it became choked with large, thin plates of rock, stacked sideways in the crack, forcing me to climb out around them and then swing back into the chimney once i'd passed below them. As I tried to get over them the plates pivoted and rotated against each other with scary grinding noises, shifting in their places. I would grab the edge of one of them for a hold and it would move. I eventually had to jam my fist between two of them and hope it held; then I swung my weight out into nowhere and hopped back into the chimney below the "plates", nearly expecting the whole stack of them to pull free and grind me into sausage as they fell down the shaft.

150 feet farther down, the chimney suddenly changed from a 2-foot-wide shaft to more than 6 feet wide. With a sudden 90 degree corner. I felt like loose change that was about to come raining down out of a slot, with nothing to grab hold of to stop me. In order to get past this, I had to wedge my arm and shoulder tightly into the very last few inches of the narrow section, then with my waist and both legs dangling free, I had to swing them across to catch a friction foothold on one of the walls of the wider section below. It was going to be too wide to touch both walls at once, so I'd have to somehow swing over to just one wall and climb down that for the next 30-40 feet like a single cliff, before the chimney came close together again to offer more close-walled security.

I made it past that and I don't even know how. At times it was so rough I came close to just closing my eyes, saying goodbye, and launching myself out into the empty airshaft, to seek my destruction on the rocks hundreds of feet below. But I still hadn't fallen yet, and move after move kept working, so I just kept going, even if my brain was turning to pulp trying to digest the insanity of what I was doing.

Many crises later, I eventually made it all the way down to where I could see that my chimney did actually go all the way through to solid ground below. And yet I knew I could still screw up and die just 30 feet from success.

When it was finally over, I sat down on a rock and looked back up. What I saw was a no-man's land of tortured, vertical rock, split by a dark chimney that twisted and soared upward, almost out of sight, to near the top of the unnamed pinnacle. A place that if seen from below, I never would have made an attempt to climb there, even with a harness and rope and protection. And yet here I had levitated myself down that 600 feet of doom just because it was my only remaining choice. It was definitely better than dying on top in the snowstorm that arrived that night.

That was pretty heavy shit, with absolutely unbelievable visuals, sights that I still don't even dare to fully remember. I did not feel like I fully deserved to survive what I had just survived. I half walked, half stumbled down the trail back to Devil's Postpile, in silence. I avoided people's eyes and conversation for the rest of the day. I didn't tell anyone for a while for fear that if I did, the death I cheated would jump out around the corner and kill me after all.

That's my OH SHIT story. Take my advice, don't ever hang by four fingertips over certain-death air. It kind of fries your soul. I don't think this experience made my life richer -- just a lot weirder.

Yours truly,
Telegasm

[Samwich]

Telegasm. Fu-cking A! that is one of the scariest things i've ever read. my hands were actually sweating as i read that. I can see how that would fry your soul...

I don't think anyone can really top that. That was more than an Oh Shit moment. It was a long series of Oh Shit moments that all happened consecutively. One of them just stood out a little more than the others.

D-Day: i've heard that you launched a 100 footer and landed Jamie Pierre style, but your faith in the lord wasn't quite as strong, i guess. I've never really heard specifics though... would you mind elaborating a little bit? Sounds like a crazy story.

[FLEX]

When I was 18,4 of my friends + myself went to Mexico. One guy insisted that we go deep-sea fishing 'so he sets it up.We went early in the morning and I was super hung -over.It was an extremely low budget crappy boat and all we had to drink was warm Corona's.Within half an hour I was feeling really queasy and started puking over the side of that godforsakin' boat.I was illin' bad.After about 1.5 hours the only fish was a 3lb red snapper that the guide caught.What a joke! We returned to the dock and i was still vomiting over the side only now I had to shit real bad too.{it felt like diarreha}.Upon arrival I ran to the boathouse.Inside there was a group of old mexican dudes playing cards."Is there a washroom I could pleeeese use ?!?.." I said with a serious look of desperation+pain on my face.They paid no attention to me so I ran/waddled past the card game through the door to where I guessed the toilet was.There was a small stall w/ no door ,no water in the toilet,and it was fuckin'filthy.Upon crossing the threshhold into the stall I was hit with a stench that would curl your toes.That was it. I started puking uncontrollably.At the same time I lost all control of my bowel and started shitting like crazy.I hadn't even turned around,pulled my pants down,or sat down.I was vomiting, pooing everywhere,pissing and crying all at the same time.
Once the eruption stopped,I was in a state of shock.I was wearing white karate pants that were now completely soiled brown.I had no choice but to remove these slimey pants and tried to wipe myself with the small bits of my pants that weren't already covered w/ shit cause there was no toilet paper.I was feeling totally ill + helpless.I turned around and my buddy Tim was standing there , eyes opened wide w/his mouth hanging open w/ a look of horror, astonishment,all he could say 'HOLY SHIT,WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED?!! I said,' I need help',...I was standing naked from the waist down, the floor,walls,and myself covered in POOTim asked 'What should I do?' -I told him to find me something to wear.He looked but there was nothing .Icould see a dirty old Mexican blanket inthe corner+I told Tim to ask the old dudes if he could buy it from them.He asked but they paid no attention to him.I then told him to just grab it.He threw me the blanket which I wrapped around my waist and we made a run for it.Man,did I ever stink+there was still diarreaha all over my legs.Then we had a 20 min. stinking cab ride back to the hotel. Good times

[powdog]

ROTFL!!! That is quality!

My biggest ski "Oh Shit" was actually someone else saying oh shit before I knew what was about to happen. At Mt. Bachelor I was skiing at a good clip and saw a kicker about 60-70 meters away and thought it looked nice. I was not familiar with the area so I ripped a long fast turn towards the kicker and heard a couple snowboarders go "Ohh Shhhii...." The next thing I know I'm about 20 feet in the air with a flat landing as I failed to notice the gap between me and the kicker. The good news is that it only took a good dose is vicodin and a few beers in order to hold my head up again.

How many beers? I like the Vicodin and alcohol combination - one Vicodin and a good (dark beer, pale ale, or porter) six pack gets me skiing in the morning, first Germania (old one) chair at Alta. I kept popping Advil all day and drining beer at 1100 AM, 1:30 PM, 2:45 PM, in the bar at 4:30 PM (I snagged the last chair).

Vicodin resembled Quaaludes in synergestic relation to alcohol. Is anybody old enough to remember Quaaludes? What helps from coming down from psychedelics (LSD, mushrooms, mescalin, etc.) is a bunch of hard liquor - alcohol is a central nervous system depressant, and when your neurons are in overload - it really helps. Ditto for cocaine. But not so good with speed - you're think you're immortal and being drunk clouds your common sense. When doing amyl nitrate a straight shot of hard liquor settles the nerves.

[BENDOR]

Two weekends ago I was in a 4 door diesel f-350 with 6 doods coming home from some project fire work. We lost the tail end on the ice going 45mph and couldn't straighten it out. We fish tailed three times each time worst than the last and ended going sideways off the road into the woods. Our truck blew the back right tire upon hitting the dirt and we rolled then smashed into a tree. I had all the time in the world as we slid off the road and into the dark woods at 45mph to say OHHHHH SHHHIIITTTT! Ended up in a pile inside the truck on the low side because we ended up on our side.

[boarderline]

Telegasm wins the "OH SHIT" contest, hands down. Dangling by your digits over a drop that means certain death wins every time.

[Steezus Christ]

I hit this jump from the skiers left of a run and through the air you sail past a bunch of trees then land on another run that is a bit lower than the one I took off from, and that run has a chairlift running up the middle of it. The whole thing requires a pretty good amount of speed to pull off, and there is a large audience.

So the moment I landed, for some reason my skis just stopped like I hit super glue and I double ejected onto my face with extreme force. I broke, no shattered my brand new Smith glasses into at least 20 pieces, dislocated my shoulder, and could not move or say anything because the wind was severely knocked out of me. Problem is, I needed to yell at the 3 guys standing about 150 yards below me, unaware that my impacting them was imminent. The only thing I could think was, "Oh shit, I hope my arm doesn't get torn off when I hit them."

Yeah, I took all 3 guys out, but it stopped me enough to quick pop my shoulder back in it's socket and then proceed to vomit right under the chair lift. Very embarrassing situation, and I came away with a great concussion.

[Dr. Send]

Yeah, getting the wind knocked out of you sucks. I was riding my bike through a schoolyard once and somehow I bailed and hit my face on a picnic table, totally knocked the wind out of me (I don't really know how, because I didn't hit my chest on anything). This guy came running from way on the other side of the field to see if I was alright, and I wanted to say "yeah I'm fine" but I couldn't get any air into my lungs.

Telegasm, that sounded gnarly. Climbing's always good for a scare, eh? I've had my share of sketchy-ass highball topouts over jagged blocks of death here in Squamish. They don't really compare to your story though.

And there's the time I was climbing around at Ruby Beach in Washington and I ripped out a grapefuit-sized chunk that hit me square in the forehead. And the time I was carrying a huge bucket of handholds at the climbing gym, and I tripped on something and fell over backwards, and the bucket landed on my chest and all the holds spilled out onto my face; a good sharp one put a hole in my cheek. How embarassing. The gods must have something against my face.

[seatosky]

On Whistler at about age 14, hitting the bump run under the green chair. See a farmiliar kicker at the bottom of the run, and see my two buddies heading for it in front of me. Proceed to watch them both tail off to the side before hitting the kicker, and thinking "you pussies."

When I'm about 15' in the air I realize the LZ is a DITCH that wasn't there the season before. 'Oh shit'.

Ended up eating my right knee but only ending up with one badly chipped front incisor. Ahh to be 14, stupid, and made of rubber.


Was riding the chair up on Big White a few years ago and noticed some dude maching down the run off to my left, then realized that there was another person coming from the other direction on a collision course, my own 'Oh shit' was clearly echoed by a couple from the chairs directly in front of and behind mine.

One person ended up breaking both legs, the other guy broke his back and arm, ugly.

[dude_le_skibum]

seeing the snow ripple in front of me in before the bend in a S type couloir.

[gonzo]

Telegasm wins. Holeeeee fuck dude.

You gotta go back and take a picture. For you and us.

[jdabasin]

last monday, when I agreed to move in with the girlfriend.

oh shit for sure.

sorry bout that yo. hope it goes well....

[gramboh]

Telegasm that was an amazing post, very well written, I was just picturing it from what you wrote, scary stuff.

Flex, ROFL, very funny stuff, I was in Cancun this past summer and can relate, although my explosions were contained to washrooms (close call on the airplane on the way home though).

[Tri-Ungulate]

So Telegasm prompted me to crosspost my own 'OH SHIT' experience to this thread - it's here. I've also crossposted the link to The Slide Zone as well, and hope that maybe some of the discussion is helpful to others' decision-making (or how to not make a decision) while venturing into the backcountry.

I know that crossposting is considered lame by some, but the whole thread (rather than the initial post) has potentially useful information.

[SIIHP]

Back side of loveland pass, the long straight heading toward A-basin. Hardpack road but didn't think it was slick, wasn't paying attention to speed. So traveling 60 MPH approaching a turn I decide its time to slow down. Start hitting the brakes. Front slides a bit. Hit brakes lighter. Front slides a bit. Realize its so slick that just tapping the brakes is causing them to lock.

Snowbanks slow ya down nicely though...