“My immediate assessment is basic, I’m alive, my heads fine, I know I don’t have a spinal injury so I yell out I’M OKAY…but I know I’m not truly okay.” -Scott Gaffney
Scott Gaffney had a bit of time on his hands after taking a season ending tumble in April 2022 off The Eagle’s Nest (aka McConkey’s) at Palisades Tahoe and decided to breakdown exactly what went wrong will convalescing after a few days in the hospital. All told he walked away with a fractured scapula, collapsed lung, and a gnarly hematoma on his bicep. Here’s his account of the mistakes made during what might be the first double (albeit accidental) off the gnarliest feature at Palisades:
“When I got home after a few nights in the hospital following my Eagle’s Nest (aka McConkey’s) crash at Palisades Tahoe last April, I wanted to analyze what happened, and since I couldn’t do anything else, I sat down and made a little rudimentary edit out of it. But then online came an uncomfortable amount of hype surrounding the accident, so I just let the edit sit in my computer until now.
But, I figure 5% of you might find it interesting so I’ve thrown it up on YouTube. It explains a bit of the decision-making process and how skiing even familiar lines like the Nest aren’t just spur-of-the-moment choices. I’d been watching and studying through the late-season storm and I’ve skied it a dozen times. Still, sometimes shit just happens.”
