Family, friends and colleagues are remembering Michael James Ferrara, a former Aspen Snowmass ski patroller and dedicated first responder, in the wake of a tragic car accident on Highway 82.
Ferrara, 73, was turning onto the highway from the Lazy Glen neighborhood where he lived when he was struck by an oncoming car on Sept. 8 around 4:30 p.m., according to Colorado State Patrol.
Ferrara did not survive the collision and the 42-year-old Aspen resident driving the second car was hospitalized with serious injuries. The accident is still under investigation by Colorado State Patrol, but no alcohol or drug use is suspected.
Ferrara, who grew up in the small town of Williamsville near Buffalo, New York, first came to the valley to join the ski patrol in 1979. He started at Buttermilk, then went to Snowmass and eventually to Aspen Mountain.
“He was one of the first paramedics on the ski patrol and a real asset to advancing the patrol’s medical skills,” said local journalist Tim Cooney, who was a longtime friend of Ferrara’s and fellow Aspen Mountain patroller. “We were honored to save a few lives together.”
According to Cooney, Ferrara helped get the first portable cardiac defibrillator on Aspen Mountain in the late 1980s. Soon after, he led the patrol’s effort to resuscitate a man who had collapsed from a cardiac event on the deck of Bonnie’s Restaurant on a crowded spring ski day.
As Cooney describes it, “After delivering a series of shocks from the new defibrillator, Mike announced, ‘We have a pulse!’ The crowd of onlookers cheered, and it was an unforgettable moment.”
The man saved that day was Bruce Ford, who owned a painting business in the Midwest. When he'd return to Aspen for ski vacations, Cooney said Ford would hang out at ski patrol headquarters, and always brought a cake for the crew.
“Because of Mike, as well as other factors, all four (mountains) now have paramedics on the ski patrol,” Cooney said.
In addition to his work as a ski patroller, Ferrara played a large role with various emergency response groups over the decades, including Aspen Ambulance, Mountain Rescue Aspen and the Pitkin County Sheriff’s Office — and he taught EMT classes at Colorado Mountain College.
“He had a great sense of humor and a quick wit,” Cooney said. “Because of his skilled and humorous eloquence, his EMT classes were the most popular.”
Local resident John Armstrong, who now leads the Crystal Valley Environmental Protection Association, spent about 10 years working with Ferrara on ski patrol and later at the sheriff’s office.
“He was the rockstar of first response in the valley in the 1990s and into the 2000s,” he said. “And if you had an incident or what we call a wreck, Mike was the guy that you wanted to have show up as your paramedic.”
Armstrong recalls that in his early days on ski patrol, Ferrara earned the nickname “Mongo” after the tough outlaw in the Mel Brooks’ comedy “Blazing Saddles.”
“He thrived on the excitement and the challenge and the risk of what he did,” he said. “And he just could not tolerate boredom; boredom did not enter into Mike's life.”
For all his thrill seeking, Armstrong also remembered him as “a giving soul.”
“He put his heart out there and he worked so hard to make this community safer,” Armstrong said. “There was never a time that I remember when Mike did not rise to the occasion.”
Local paramedic Randy Eis, who taught EMT classes with Ferrara at CMC and worked with him on ski patrol and at Aspen Ambulance, agreed.
“He had a real dedication to the community at large,” Eis said. “He was just really always looking to help people."
According to Eis, part of Ferrara’s ability to empathize with people came from the sudden loss of his father when he was 15.
“I think that was one of the burning things that kinda moved him forward in helping people,” he said. “You know, especially working as a coroner and being there for families (in tragedies).”
Eis recalled that he and Ferrara saved a lot of lives together over the years.
“My first five or six years working on the ambulance here in Aspen, he and I as partners probably brought maybe two to four people each year back (to life),” he said.
But not every emergency had a positive outcome, and that eventually took a toll on Ferrara.
As a sheriff's deputy and assistant coroner, he was one of the first to respond to the fatal plane crash in 2001 that killed all 18 passengers and crew.
“Our first responders see things that no one should ever see, and that was certainly not Mike's only challenging incident,” Armstrong said. “He saw a lot of tough stuff and I really think that he always gave his all, he did the best he could, and it had that cumulative effect on Mike.”
In 2010, Ferrara was featured in an Outside Magazine article titled “The Man Who Saw Too Much.” In it he reflected on his struggles with the PTSD he’d developed working as a first responder.
“My identity and self-esteem were wrapped up in this life,” Ferrara told Outside Magazine. “How could I admit I was so broken? I’d been doing this for more than 25 years.”
In recent years, Ferrara continued to open up about his struggles with PTSD and became an advocate for other emergency responders like him dealing with mental health challenges.
“He gave talks and put out some articles in rescue magazines and other educational stuff about how to recognize when the stress is too much for you and how to find ways to deal with it constructively,” Eis said. “He wanted to help people who have fallen off the wagon or had some troubles.”
Eis, who once had to confront Ferrara about his substance abuse related to PTSD, said he was glad to see him getting his life back on track.
“He went ahead and, you know, got himself all straightened out and he was doing pretty good,” Eis said.
Ferrara, who was also a climber and mountaineer, took some time away from the valley over the years and worked as a medic and guide on Mount Denali in Alaska, Rainier in Washington, and Everest in the Himalayas as well as a ski patroller in Utah, but he always returned to Aspen.
According to Eis, Ferrara was still giving education talks to the ski patrol and was scheduled to speak to local patrollers this fall ahead of the upcoming ski season.
Eis, Armstrong and Cooney agreed that anyone that knew “Mongo” won’t soon forget him.
“Many people are walking around alive today because of Mike’s skills and dedication to the local community and beyond,” Cooney said.
Ferrara was also dedicated to training search and rescue dogs, and his own dogs were a big part of his life and work. Two of his German Shepherds were in the car with him during the crash last week and survived.
Michael Ferrara is also survived by his sister, Janet Ferrara, who lives in the valley. She formerly managed the Given Institute, a think tank at the University of Colorado’s School of Medicine and currently volunteers for community organizations.
His sister, friends and colleagues plan to honor him with a memorial on Sept. 30 at 2 p.m. at the Mountain Rescue Aspen headquarters.
The Michael Ferrara Memorial Fund has also been created at Alpine Bank to support Mountain Rescue Aspen as well as programs for people suffering from PTSD and training search and rescue dogs.
