Seasonal and In-season Equipment Inspection For Alpine Rental Ski Equipment
An Overview
Industry standards, those standards by which you will be held to if questions arise about the relative safety of your rental fleet, dictate that regular inspections be performed at specific intervals.
Annual - Pre Season Inspection
All components of the release system (bindings and boots) must be inspected. Bindings both used and new are visibly inspected and released tested using an approved testing device with a specific reference boot. Bindings that fail must go through a trouble shooting procedure to identify and correct the deviation or malfunction. If the procedure does not correct the problem the binding must be removed from the inventory. In addition all rental boots, new and used must be visibly inspected for damage, wear, contamination, broken or missing parts or inferior materials at contact points with the binding. Boots also must be tested using an approved testing device. One boot per ‘cell’ is selected for all boots that are new to the rental inventory. A ‘cell’ is all boots of the same make, model, age, and shell size. Also a random selection of 5% of the existing inventory is also tested. Tests are performed with a selected ‘reference’ pair of bindings. If a boot fails, all boots from that cell are then tested. Boots that fail and cannot be repaired are removed from inventory.
In-season Inspection
In-season inspection are performed on the complete rental systems to ensure that the equipment is adjusted appropriately and continues to function correctly. Typically 5% of the rental inventory is tested during each two week sampling period. The random sample is divided into a category for equipment just returned or about to be rented and a category for equipment remaining in the fleet.. Testing for just rented or returned equipment must use the actual skiers information while the equipment from the remaining inventory may use a fictional skiers parameters. Only single skis not pairs need to be tested and testing only requires the binding be tested at the toe in one direction. Frequency of additional testing is dependent on rate of failure in the random sampling. Inventories failing an inspection must have inspections performed daily until the source of the problem is found and corrected. As the inspection results improve the frequency of inspections can then be relaxed.
For complete requirements and testing parameters you must refer the specific binding manufacturers workbook which will contain detailed procedures and requirements based their bindings and ASTM and ISO standards.
To perform the necessary testing you will need to have an approved and calibrated testing device on hand to maintain your in-season testing. It is not possible to simply have your fleet tested once at the beginning of the season and not perform in-season testing and remain in compliance with industry standards.
Adhering to and documenting the results of the tests required by these standards are an integral part of a comprehensive ‘risk management’ program. Not adhering to these standards invites the potential for lawsuits based on negligence. There is a myth that the government can’t be sued. This is not true and suits have been filed and won against outdoor recreation departments who were found not to be adhering to current industry standards of testing and proper documention of the results.
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