Ice Man 30:22

Hey Prime members, you can binge 8 new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. 10,000 feet up, deep inside of the beautiful Austrian Alps, lies a very unique and not well-known tourist destination. The only way you can get to this destination is to ride a gondola, or if you're feeling really motivated, you could, in theory, hike up to it, but very few people do that.

Anyways, once you actually reach this tourist destination, you walk over to this string of buildings and right away you start to see all these signs warning you about this area.

The signs tell you that while of course this area is stunning and beautiful, remember it's also very dangerous. And so today I'm going to tell you a horror story that happened at this unique dangerous tourist location. And be sure you stick around until the very end because there are actually two plot twists that happen in this story. The first one you might see coming, but the second one you won't.

But before we get into today's story, if you're a fan of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious delivered in story format, then you've come to the right podcast because that's all we do and we upload twice a week, once on Monday and once on Thursday.

So, if that's of interest to you, please go to the Amazon Music Follow Button's Big Garage Sale and proceed to haggle with them really aggressively over the prices of their most expensive and prized items, to the point where they basically have to ignore all their other customers just to deal with you. And then finally, when they relent and offer you a fair and decent price for their prized items, just say, I'm not actually interested. I don't have any money. And then just turn around and leave. Okay, let's get into today's story.

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On August 9th, 1989, 23-year-old Duncan McPherson pulled his little red car into a parking lot inside of a lush green valley in Vienna, Austria. After parking his car, Duncan reached across his middle console and he grabbed an apple out of a bag, and then he took a bite and just admired the unbelievable landscape all around him. He was near the Austrian Alps, and so there were literally just mountains jutting up everywhere.

Duncan, who was originally from Canada, had been this highly touted, unbelievable first-round draft pick by the New York Islanders back in 1984. The Islanders are a professional ice hockey team in the United States. But despite Duncan's incredible promise and athleticism, he just couldn't ever get it together, and so he never actually made the New York Islanders big league roster.

And so, in 1989, Duncan started to realize that maybe his hockey career was coming to an end. But instead of just hanging up the skates in frustration, Duncan decided he would pursue a different type of career that kept him still within the hockey world. He would become a coach.

And so, in 1989, Duncan had agreed to coach this small-time professional hockey team in Scotland. And for Duncan, his thought was, you know, I'll go there, I'll learn how to be a good coach, and then down the road, I'll maybe have the opportunity to coach much more prominent and prestigious teams. But before moving to Scotland and beginning this new career, Duncan decided what he really needed right now was just to take a break.

Because for basically his whole life, Duncan had been playing hockey around the clock practically seven days a week. You don't get to become a first round draft pick unless hockey is your life. And so Duncan thought, you know what, before I begin this huge life transition, I'm going to just kick back and relax and go on a huge European vacation. And one of the first stops of this vacation was going to be the Austrian Alps right in front of him.

However, he wasn't just going to look at these incredible mountains, he was going to snowboard down them. Or more specifically, he was going to learn how to snowboard on these incredible mountains. And so Duncan finished eating his apple and then chucked the core into the bag. And then he hopped out of his car, shut the door, locked it, and then began walking across the parking lot towards the white gondola station.

A gondola is like a ski lift, but much bigger. It's kind of like a small bus with lots of windows, and it's connected to a cable, and that cable, which is elevated off the ground, pulls you up and down mountains. Now, typically, people ride gondolas just for the incredible view of the mountain from up high.

But some gondolas are actually in place to take people to specific locations in the mountain. And typically these locations are areas that are not accessible otherwise. You need a gondola to get there. And in Duncan's case, the gondola that he was about to hitch a ride on was of the latter variety.

It carried passengers from the station near this parking lot high up into the Austrian Alps up to about 10,000 feet of elevation where there was another gondola station called the Eisgrot Mountain Station. And right next to the Eisgrot Mountain Gondola Station was a very unique ski resort called the Stubai Glacier. And overwhelmingly, this ski resort was the reason why people were taking this gondola.

This ski resort was unique not only because it was very hard to get to, you basically had to take a gondola or hike up to it, but also because the actual slope that skiers and snowboarders would use at this resort was not just a snowy mountainside like virtually all other ski resorts around the world are.

No, instead, the Stubai Glacier Ski Resort was a glacier. And so people were literally skiing and snowboarding on a glacier, hence the name. And a glacier, in simple terms, is just a huge swath of thick, permanently frozen ice.

And so in the warmer months when other ski resorts around the world were not able to continue operations because there was no snow or it was too warm to make snow, the Stubai Glacier Ski Resort did not have that problem. Because in those warmer months, they could just drive their huge snowcat tractors with their big rakes behind them

all over the slope, the glacier, and their rakes would basically chop up the top layer of the ice, turning it into powder for people to ski on, which allowed them to basically stay open every day of the year.

And so Duncan, back down in the parking lot, he walked over to the gondola station, he bought his gondola ticket, and then he hitched a ride on the first gondola that swung through the station. And after a slow but beautiful ride up into the mountains, where all that lush greenery down below in the valley was replaced by jagged snow and ice up in the Alps, Duncan finally saw the Stubai Glacier Ski Resort and the glacier itself right behind it that stretched up to the top of the mountain.

A few minutes later, the gondola Duncan was on arrived at the Eisgrot Mountain Gondola Station, and Duncan, along with the others inside of the gondola, hopped off, and then Duncan immediately walked over to the resort and headed into the equipment rental store. And after getting his snowboard and his boots and all the other equipment he would need, he headed right back outside to wait for his instructor to arrive. Duncan had previously purchased a lesson with an instructor at the resort. It was set for 11 a.m.

And so Duncan, he's out there at the foot of this glacier and right at 11, an instructor walks over and introduces himself and Duncan and the instructor immediately start getting into the basics of snowboarding, you know, how to put your boots into your bindings, how to use the edges of your board. And then for a little while, the instructor and Duncan didn't go up the glacier. Instead, they just kind of worked on some basics on the flat ground right there.

And then after the instructor felt like Duncan was ready to go, they both walked over to the tow rope, which is a way to get to the top of the slope. There's a cable that kind of rotates from the top to the bottom of the mountain, and there are all these bars attached to the cable. And skiers and snowboarders grab the bar while standing on their snowboard or their skis, and they literally get pulled up the mountain.

And so Duncan and the instructor grabbed onto the tow rope, they made their way to the top of the glacier, and from there they pushed over to the start of the run. And once they were there, the instructor strapped into his snowboard, and then Duncan strapped into his, and then they were off. Very

very slowly making their way kind of like a falling leaf pattern. Duncan was not just going straight down the mountain, he's a beginner. And so it's very slow, very controlled. And as they went down, you know, the instructors giving Duncan tips how to stay more on his edge, how to slow down, how to speed up.

And very quickly, the instructor saw that Duncan was so good at balancing, his legs were so strong, likely because he was a professional hockey player. And so the instructor was telling Duncan the whole time they're going down how unbelievably good he was doing for his first lesson.

And so finally, after about an hour of very slowly making their way all the way down this glacier, they reached the bottom where they had first been doing some flat ground stuff. And when they got there, it had started to rain. And it was raining bad enough that lots of people on the mountain were abandoning the mountain and running inside of the resort to get out from under the rain. And so the instructor, he looked at his watch and he realized they were almost at 1 p.m., which was the end of their lesson. And

And he said to Duncan, you know, I don't think we have time to go back up. Plus, it's raining. Duncan said he didn't care about the rain, but he also understood that, you know, it wasn't ideal conditions. And so they decided that even though there was a few minutes left, they would just cancel the lesson right there and they would actually just go inside and grab lunch together.

And so they made their way out of the rain into the resort. And when they went inside the resort, the instructor noticed that Duncan's sweater, which was underneath his yellow rain jacket, was totally soaked. And so he offered to Duncan, you know, hey, do you want to take your sweater off and I'll hang it up inside my office? And, you know, by the end of the day, it should be dry. And Duncan thought, great, that's fine. So he took off his wet sweater. He gave it to the instructor. And while the instructor was going to his office, Duncan went into the gift shop and he just bought a new sweater for the day.

And after that, Duncan had his new sweater on with his rain jacket over it, and then he met the instructor in the cafeteria, where they both sat down and had a nice meal. They got to know each other a little bit better. After they were done eating, both of them looked out the window and saw the rain had subsided.

But in its place was lots of fog that was rolling in and so very few people were going back onto the mountain. But the instructor told Duncan that, you know, "Hey, you did so good today that you should really go back out there on your own this afternoon and practice. Do some runs, go nice and slow, same as I was teaching you. And then tomorrow when we have our follow-up lesson, we can maybe, you know, get into some more advanced things." Duncan thought that was a great idea. He said he would definitely go out there and practice on his own.

And then the two men cleaned up and the instructor made his way to meet his next client. And Duncan headed right outside, grabbed a snowboard and began walking towards the tow rope. Mr. Balling Collection is sponsored by BetterHelp.

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The next morning, Duncan's snowboard instructor arrived a little bit early to work. And so after getting off the gondola, he made his way over to the resort and he grabbed a cup of coffee in the same cafeteria where he and Duncan had eaten the day before. And then after finishing that coffee, the instructor grabbed a snowboard and the rest of his gear and then headed outside to meet Duncan in the meeting spot they had both agreed on.

But when it was time for the lesson to start, Duncan didn't show up. And so the instructor for a second thought, you know, was there somewhere else we were going to meet? Did I get the time wrong? But he checked the time and he remembered the conversation he had with Duncan. They were going to meet at the foot of the tow rope and he was right there and Duncan wasn't. And so he thought, OK, you know, maybe Duncan's running late. But he waited and waited and waited and Duncan never showed up.

The instructor was bummed because he and Duncan really had kind of become friends the day before, and he was looking forward to teaching Duncan some more today. But the instructor knew it was pretty common for tourists to cancel their follow-up snowboard or ski lessons. It's like they show up for that first day, they get really into it, they plan on going the next day, but then other distractions in their vacation pull them elsewhere and they no-show for the lesson.

And so the instructor didn't take it personally, he just assumed that, you know, Duncan had found something else to do that was more fun. But the instructor knew he would see Duncan again because Duncan's sweater was still sitting in the instructor's office.

One week later, Duncan's parents, who were back home in Saskatoon, Canada, got a very unexpected phone call from the Dundee Tigers hockey team, which was the professional hockey team in Scotland that Duncan was going to go coach after this big European vacation. The team rep for this hockey team asked the parents if they knew where their son was because he had not shown up for his first day of work.

And Duncan's parents, they immediately were like, that doesn't make any sense. He was so excited about this job. This is a really big deal for him. He would never miss the first day. And so the parents told the team rep that they would try to get in touch with Duncan. And as soon as they did, they'd be in touch with the team. And the team rep said they would do the exact same thing for the parents.

However, after this call, the parents quickly realized that trying to get in touch with their son was going to be nearly impossible. They knew Duncan had gone on this big European vacation, but they didn't have his itinerary. They didn't know what countries he was going to, in what order. They really only knew that he was really excited and he was just going to be on vacation. That was kind of it.

And remember, this is 1989. They can't just call Duncan. There weren't cell phones. They didn't have the easy modern ways that we all communicate instantly. And so the parents are like, who do we even call? Where do we go? What do we do? And so ultimately, even though this felt kind of dramatic at the time, the parents decided to file a missing person report with Interpol, which is an organization that connects police across international lines.

However, the parents quickly learned that this missing person report was not going to become a high priority item for any police anywhere in Europe because their son was 23, he's healthy, he's strong, he's smart, he's of sound mind. And really all that had happened was Duncan had missed a single day of work on the back end of a huge vacation. So there's lots of reasons why that could have happened.

Maybe he extended his vacation. Yeah, it's not professional, but it's totally possible. Or maybe he doesn't want to take the job after all. Or maybe he's just running late. I mean, there's a lot of very logical explanations for why Duncan didn't show up. And so, in short, the parents were told that if you want to find your son right now and not just wait for him to reappear, well, you better go looking yourself. And without hesitation, that

that's exactly what Duncan's parents did. They packed up a couple of suitcases and they headed to Europe to go find their son. Because to them, it felt like something was wrong here and there was no time to waste.

But again, the parents have no idea where their son would have gone in Europe. And so they don't really have a good starting point. They don't know who to talk to. But they just began chasing down every single seemingly insignificant lead they came across. And as they traveled all over Europe, they hung up thousands and thousands of flyers that showed their son's face, said he was missing. And, you know, here's a number to call if you know where he is.

But despite these efforts, the parents really got nowhere.

That is, until about a month into their search, when still they have not found Duncan, they have no idea where he is, they've chased down all these leads, they've all dead-ended. And at this time, the parents convinced several news outlets around Europe to air a segment on their news about Duncan. And one of those missing person segments aired in Austria. And the news anchor in Austria, when they were doing the segment, they described the car that

that Duncan was almost definitely driving when he went missing. It was that little red car. The parents had discovered in chasing down their leads that their son had borrowed the little red car from a childhood friend who used to play hockey with him, and the friend had told the parents that he had lent it to Duncan, and Duncan had told him he would have it for a week and then return it. But Duncan had never returned the car.

And so the anchor in Austria does this segment about how Duncan is missing. And if you have information, come forward. They describe the little red car. And sure enough, not long after the segment aired in Austria, somebody found Duncan's car. It was still sitting in that parking lot right near the Stubai Glacier gondola.

Immediately when Duncan's parents heard about this, they flew to Vienna, Austria and they met with police who brought them out to look at their son's car. They hadn't moved it, it was still just sitting where he had left it. And then also police showed the parents what they had found inside of the car, which included Duncan's passport, a letter to his girlfriend where he talked about how excited he was to go to Scotland, and also a bag of rotten fruit.

The police also told the parents that now with the discovery of this vehicle, they were going to really lean into this missing person case to try to find their son and that the next day they were going to launch this huge search of the area near where his car was to hopefully find Duncan.

And so the parents who were now cautiously optimistic that they might get some answers, they left the police and they went to a local hotel to rest up before the next day when they would be up early and join this huge search party. But when they got to that local hotel, they did what they always did everywhere they went in Europe. They began handing out all these missing person flyers with Duncan's face on them to everybody they saw in the lobby. They began hanging them up all over the hotel.

And sure enough, just by completely random chance, they handed one of these flyers to Duncan's snowboard instructor. They handed it to him, he looked at it, and he did a double take, and he was like, I know him. And he explained how he taught Duncan how to snowboard, and then Duncan didn't show up the next day, and he just figured, you know, okay, he blew it off to go do something else, but he'd come back for his sweater, but he never came back for his sweater, and he never heard from Duncan again.

And so the parents, they have been searching all of Europe for a month and they haven't talked to anybody who knew Duncan. They've gotten nowhere. And now they've just randomly stumbled on probably the last person to see Duncan before he went missing.

And so they kept asking the instructor, you know, give us more information. You know, what was his attitude like? Was he stressed out? Was he scared? Was he worried about something? Where did he go? Give us anything. But the instructor really didn't have that much more information to offer. And so he tried to answer all their questions, but really just finally said, look, I'm sorry. All I know is after we ate lunch together on the 9th,

Duncan said he was going to go out and do some practice runs, but I never actually saw him go up. I didn't see him come down. I just assumed he went up there and was kind of on his own for the day. And then, of course, the next day I didn't see him and he never came back. And so I'm sorry. That's all I know. And so the parents finally said, you know, thank you so much for the information. Please get in touch with us if you remember anything. And the instructor said he would. And then after that, the parents made their way to their room and they went to bed.

The next morning, the parents got up early and they headed to that parking lot where Duncan's car was, and there were all these people, police officers and volunteers, that were there to be a part of this big search party. And so after the parents explained to the leaders of the search party what the instructor had told them, that very likely their son had been up at the Stubai Glacier Ski Resort when he went missing, the entire search party quickly hopped on gondolas and made their way up there.

And all day, this search party combed this glacier up and down. They walked all around to the backside of this mountain. They rappelled down cliffs and they hiked all over this entire segment of the mountain. But nobody found anything that gave away where Duncan had gone.

And the next day, it was the same story. Huge search party looking everywhere, expanding the search, not just Stubai Glacier, but basically all over this entire swath of mountain range. But still, they found nothing. And so at the end of the second day, the authorities went up to Duncan's parents and they told them that, unfortunately, we can't continue this search. We're calling it off.

But Duncan's parents, they didn't call off the search. They continued searching for another 14 years. And over that timeframe, they went back to Stew by Glacier over and over and over again. They searched it up and down. They knew all the staff members. They knew all the nooks and crannies of the entire place. But they never found any sign of their son.

Fast forward to July of 2003, so 14 years after Duncan had gone missing, and a Stew by Glacier ski resort employee was riding the tow rope towards the top of the mountain when they noticed there was a bright yellow piece of trash right in the middle of the slope. And so the employee rode the tow rope just a little bit higher, and then he let go and skied down to this yellow thing. He reached down and he began pulling on this piece of yellow, and suddenly he stopped.

and absolutely horrified he realized this was not trash. While no one knows for sure what happened to Duncan, here is the leading theory that Duncan's family and authorities, for the most part, agree on.

Back on August 9th, 1989, after having lunch with his snowboard instructor, Duncan was feeling motivated to go back out and take some practice runs. And so he headed outside. He looked up at the glacier. There's all this fog rolling in, but it's not raining. And so nobody's on the slope. And so it's perfect for a beginner. He's going to have this place to himself. And so he grabs his board. He makes his way over to the tow rope. He straps in. He grabs onto a bar and he makes his way to the top.

Once he gets off, he makes his way over to the start of the run, he puts his other foot into his binding, he makes sure he's all set, and then he stood up and began slowly kind of waffling his way down the completely vacant and very foggy slope.

And as he was going along, he got more and more confident and began going a little bit faster and a little bit faster until finally he was basically just bombing it down the mountain, relying on his natural balance and strength to kind of keep him up. And then all of a sudden he caught an edge and flipped forward and smashed into the ground. And when he did, he broke his leg.

The unique danger to humans when it comes to glaciers is something called a crevasse. Basically, cracks form in the ice, and sometimes these cracks can be massive, like mind-bogglingly massive, hundreds and hundreds of feet, that if you fall into this thing, you're done. No one's getting you out of there. You are falling either to your death or you're falling so far down that no one can get to you.

Or, like in the case of Stubai Glacier Ski Resort, they had the issue of little crevasses forming kind of all over the place. Especially if it rained, the rain would begin to crack the ice, or if maybe it was warmer than usual, the ice would crack here and there. And so the resort was really good about constantly patrolling their slope to make sure no crevasses had formed anywhere on the slope.

And so when you got to Stew by Glacier Ski Resort, you were warned that there is such a thing as a crevasse. This is a real glacier, so make sure you're looking around and don't fall into one. Well, because it had rained, a crevasse had formed, a small one like a pothole, in the slope. But because it was so foggy because of the rain, as Duncan was bombing down, he didn't see it, and that's what he caught his edge on, causing him to fall and break his leg.

And so Duncan, he's now stranded in the middle of the slope. He's not close enough to the bottom to where he could pull himself into the resort. He's not close enough to the top where he could get himself up there and talk to the tow lift operator. And so he's just kind of stranded. There's nobody on the mountain. It's so foggy, nobody can see him from the resort. And so he's just stuck in agonizing pain, wondering what he's supposed to do.

At the same time this was happening, another ski resort employee was climbing into one of those big snow-cat tractors at the top of the glacier. These tractors were what the resort used to chop the top layer of ice and turn it into snow. And because it had rained that day, a lot of the snow had melted, and so this employee needed to basically go over the entire slope from top to bottom and grind up the ice and make some new snow.

And so the employee hopped in the cab of this tractor, shut the door, turned on the engine, turned on the back rake, which in your head, picture a long stretch of metal dragging behind this tractor that had rotating blades that cut into the snow as it moved along.

And so this employee, after turning on the rake and making sure everything worked, they drove the snowcat and the rake onto the start of the downward slope, and they began crisscrossing back and forth across the entire slope, turning it all into fresh snow.

And as this employee drove, they were very careful not to go too quick because they knew they couldn't see very far with all of the fog. And so they're going like one or two miles an hour, being very cautious. And then suddenly at the last second, they see something in the snow. It kind of appeared out of the fog. And so the employees swerved as fast as they could to avoid hitting it. And they did narrowly miss it. Their big tank-like treads that are on these tractors just missed running this thing over. However,

The back rake with the rotating blades did not miss this object. It went right over it. The employee immediately parked the snowcat and then leapt outside and ran over to see what this thing was. And when they got there, they could not believe what they saw. It was Duncan. And all those rotating blades that had crossed over him had basically mutilated him.

One of his arms had been cut off, one of his legs was nearly cut off, but it's believed Duncan was actually not dead. The injuries were horrible, but they would not necessarily have killed him outright. He would bleed to death without help, but in theory he could have been saved.

But the employee, even though this was a total accident, totally panicked and decided that because it was so foggy, no one must have seen this. No one was around. And so no one would know that they were the ones who ran this guy over. And so instead of helping Duncan, they just tied him up and dragged him behind the snowcat off of the glacier over to this area where this employee knew there was a very deep crevasse.

And they chucked Duncan, who might have been alive at this point, into the crevasse along with his arm and his severed leg. And then the employee used the snowcat tractor to rake over the crevasse. They filled it all in and packed it down. And then they drove down the rest of the way and just hoped no one would ever know.

But over the course of the next 14 years, the glacier would melt more and more each year until finally Duncan's yellow jacket popped through the ice. And that's what the resort employees saw as they were going up the tow lift and thought it was trash. It was actually Duncan's jacket. They skied over, they tried to pull it out of the snow, only to then see literally in the ice, Duncan McPherson looking right back up at them.

and Duncan still looked like he was 23 years old because he had been frozen this entire time. According to the Stew by Glacier Ski Resort, Duncan must have just fallen into this crevasse and died. That's what they say happened, and some authorities say that is what happened. But when they pulled Duncan out of the ice and they found his body had been chopped apart, and his snowboard had even been chopped apart, that told a very different story.

As for the snowcat driver who drove over Duncan, they were never actually officially identified or charged with any crime because there was a statute of limitations that had run out by 2003. And so no one has ever been held accountable for Duncan's death.

Thank you for listening to the Mr. Ballin Podcast. If you enjoyed today's story and you're looking for more bone-chilling content, be sure to check out all of our studios' podcasts. Those are Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries, Bedtime Stories, and Run Full. Just search for Ballin Studios wherever you get your podcasts and you will find all of them. Also, there are hundreds more stories like the one you listened to today, but in video format, on our YouTube channel. And our YouTube channel is just called Mr. Ballin. Go check it out.

So that's going to do it. I really appreciate your support. Until next time, see ya.

Hey, Prime members, you can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. And before you go, please tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com slash survey. I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York. I was like at my locker and she came up to me and she was like stuttering super bad. I'm like, stop f***ing around. She's like...

I can't. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast. It's like doubling and tripling, and it's all these girls. With a diagnosis the state tried to keep on the down low. Everybody thought I was holding something back. Well, you were holding something back intentionally. Yeah, yeah, well, yeah. Yeah.

No, it's hysteria. It's all in your head. It's not physical. Oh my gosh, you're exaggerating. Is this the largest mass hysteria since The Witches of Salem? Or is it something else entirely? Something's wrong here. Something's not right. Leroy was the new dateline and everyone was trying to solve the murder. A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios. Hysterical.

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