Let me start off by saying it’s too early to tell- this could be an isolated incident or a major design flaw with Salomon’s entry into the AT world. At this point it’s simply something to keep in mind for those of you shopping for new AT boots next year. Salomon makes a great boot, so I’m sure many of you were interested in their AT offerings, which just came out mid-season.
On Mt. Washington in New Hampshire, a skier on exposed terrain fell and severely injured his leg. Doctors are hoping to save the leg, but he may never be able to ski again. The worst part is that he and his companions are insisting that the fall was caused by the dynafit-compatible “tech fittings” in his boot ripping out and causing the fall. For more information on this, go here and here. It also seems that at least one product tester also experienced a problem with the fittings not staying in the boot.
This isn’t a great photo, which is all I could find on the internet since Salomon doesn’t even have the boots on their website yet, but here it is:
I haven’t gotten a look at these boots in person, but some folks are wondering if there is enough material surrounding the inserts to keep them in place, or if there is a defect within the inserts themselves. One other thing to perhaps take note of is that the injured party weighs 260lbs- that weight, combined with big skis and aggressive skiing, may be more than the dynafit system can handle at either the binding or boot end, in my opinion.
In any case, we certainly wish the best for Dalton and his recovery, and if this is an engineering defect, lets hope it’s fixed before next fall when they will be more widely available. Also, if anyone knows of other failures in this boot, please get in contact with Dalton and leave a comment here, as these are things that need to be known.
EDIT 4/22/10 Lou did a great service by buying a set of sole blocks and quickly and easily blowing them up. That post is here. Really sad someone had to get so severely injured to prove that these things are shoddy. Yeah, they’ll probably be fixed by next season, but I’m not sure I would want to have anything to do with Salomon after seeing the lack of engineering put into these sole blocks. Buyer beware indeed.
[...] much we, as ski mountaineers, rely on our gear to perform flawlessly and get us home safely. The potential failure of an AT boot, and the injuries caused by that failure, really drives the point home- if your gear fails, [...]