Icy conditions will always be a challenge despite the use of self-arrest poles. Once momentum is gained from a skiing fall or unchecked fall while climbing, it is doubtful that even a a well deployed ice axe would work on a knife hardness, icy and steep surface such as the conditions encountered in the report that we received. Here is the submission:

“sliding fall. after climbing 2/3 of the way up hillmans and not finding a ton of good snow we transitioned for our Icy decent. I was the the third and final member of my group to descend. There was a small ribbon of wind slab on the skis right side of the Slide, hand shears had shown positive results. My two partners side slipped the ice to a good point of safety. I tried the wind slab but after a few untrustworthy turns in it I bailed for the more predictable surface of ice. After coming to a stop I started skiing once more and on my second turn I went down. I have practice self arresting on snow with a whippet and skis on but not on ice. I tried twice to self arrest with no luck. I slid for about 200ft before managing to slow myself down in some soft snow that was piled on top of a rock. Unfortunately as i came to a stop my body turned and I fell of the side of the rock landing on my shoulder and dislocating it. My partners and I were able to get in to the pine tree area where we tired to reset the joint with no luck. We slung and secured my arm. I transitioned to crampons and self rescued with a fast stop at hojo to get an ice pack. I then boot packed pinkham then the hospital. A few things I noticed: even with practice my whippet was not an adequate self arresting device in the ice conditions and also my skis made it impossible to roll on to my stomach and execute a proper self arrest.”