Skier dangling from chair lift falls safely into waiting net

Jan. 5 (UPI) -- A visitor to a California ski resort captured video of a skier trapped upside-down on a chair lift dropping safely into a net held by rescuers.

Phillip Wilcoxon posted a video to Instagram showing the skier, danging from a Mammoth Mountain resort chair lift upside-down, falling 20 feet in to the waiting net.

"One of my biggest fears going skiing is that I'm going to accidentally fall off the lift, but not only falling off and now getting caught on the lift, it's just really my worst nightmare," the skier, Anastasia Semenov, 18, later told KTLA-TV.

The incident occurred about 12:30 p.m. Thursday.

"We were getting ready to get on the chair when we looked back to sit down, and the safety bar was down, but it should have been up so it was blocking us from sitting down," Semenov said. "And then my leg and my ski somehow got caught on the foot ledge. And then the machine -- the lift didn't stop, so it just took me up with it."

She said falling was scary, but she wasn't injured.

"I don't really know, it happened so quickly, I just let go and fell into the night," Semenov said. "They caught me, it didn't hurt at all."

Mammoth Mountain addressed the issue in a brief statement.

"Mammoth Mountain personnel and other guests quickly responded, using a catch net to safely rescue the skier. The skier was uninjured and returned to skiing that afternoon," the statement read.