Group of Kids Save Young Boy Dangling from Chairlift 20 Feet Above Ground

By Amanda Thomason March 1, 2019 at 4:30pm

Sometimes when packs of young people are out roaming, people assume they’re up to no good. They must be scouting for trouble, looking for rules to break.

That certainly isn’t true of all groups, as this band of five young men proved. Several homeschooled boys were hitting the slopes of Grouse Mountain in Vancouver, Canada, for the day.

Plenty of other folks were out for the day, as well, taking advantage of the conditions to spend the day with family.

One unnamed family got more adventure than they bargained for. Mom, dad, an 8-year-old and a 3-year-old were riding the lift when the 8-year-old boy somehow slipped and dangled from the lift chair.

The dad desperately held on, but he was also trying to secure his 3-year-old next to him, and try as he might, he could not haul his son back into the chair.

The snow was 20 feet below them, and the chair was continuing to move, according to what one of the homeschoolers told the Vancouver Sun. While dad held on, the group of boys noticed what was happening.

“People were there but they were just standing looking at the kid, not knowing what to do,” Joshua Ravensbergen, age 12, said.

“They pointed to the lift and I saw the kid dangling,” Ethan Harvey, one of the group, told NBC’s Today. “I was like, ‘Holy smokes.'”

“Inside, I had anxiety,” Harvey continued. “I didn’t know what was going to happen, but I really just kind of knew, like, we could do this.”

Seeing the boy’s precarious perch and knowing they had to do something, one of the resourceful boys suggested they use a nearby section of orange plastic fencing. The group rushed to pull it up and stretch it out below the boy.

In the meantime, the group was joined by a ski instructor, a nearby adult, and another boy. The boy was instructed to kick his skis off so he could drop to safety.

They broke his fall, and the 8-year-old was a little discombobulated but unharmed. All those who helped hold the makeshift net were thanked and regarded as heroes.

“It was just instinct,” Samuel North, another boy in the group, said.

A spokesperson for Grouse Mountain Resort said they’d be looking into the cause of the incident, but there wasn’t a clear cause. One thing is clear, though: these quick-thinking boys did the right thing.

“It’s interesting to be called a hero,” Harvey admitted. “l don’t really think it’s settled in that we saved a child’s life. It’s pretty incredible.”

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