A CHAIR IS STILL A CHAIR, EVEN THOUGH THERE’S NO ONE SKIING THERE

Last week, Mammoth Mountain Ski Patrol (MMSP) Alumni Association stuck their chairs where they don’t belong.

You might have noticed them up in The Village or outside the Looney Bean storefront. You might have noticed MMSP alum, Ian Scott, power drilling one of their cheeky “Win Me” signs into their restraint bars.

According to Scott, the chairs are part of a raffle fundraising initiative, hosted by the alumni nonprofit (est. 2018) , to benefit active patrollers on Mammoth Mountain.

“A primary purpose for raising funds is for current members to further their education and job-related fundamentals,” said Scott. “They need help going to Avalanche School … to Gun School. We try to help them [pay] for the things that are going to keep them here.”

And, according to Scott, beyond trying to retain the best talent in the organization, fundraising goes toward supporting those patrollers in the case of injury. 

“Kind of like an Aflac program,” he says. “Workmen’s comp covers a lot, but it doesn’t cover everything.”

“In-house” with Patrol, money goes toward establishing a support network for those injured on the job—that might look like a hot meal spotted, a lift to physical therapy, or actually helping with the cost of that therapy itself and the other medical bills associated with the injury.

Here’s how it works.

Two chairs in The Village are up for sale, outright. A triple-seater for $2,300, and a double for $2,800. 

The rest will go to 4 lucky raffle winners—4 different chairs, 4 different raffles. There’s a Chair 23 triple sitting at the Looney Bean, and a Chair 18 stem model, Chair 18 bale model, and a double seater all up in The Village. Find where they’re parked, and scan the QR codes to buy however many $20 raffle tickets your wallet can spare. Alternatively, you can visit https://mmsp-alumni—public-page.square.site/ to check out the selection and purchase tickets for each model.

As benefactors of Rock ‘n’ Rye, held Labor Day Weekend, winners of the raffles will be announced by the MMSP Alumni Association. In true patroller fashion, names are drawn from the old ammo shell of an artillery gun, used by the team for avalanche mitigation.

Ammo shells, fear not, will also be available for purchase at the event. 

I asked Scott to tell me, in his own words, why the public should kick in a Jackson to benefit Mammoth Mountain Ski Patrol—past, present, and future.

“Well,” he said, “they’re there for you when you need them.”