Industry News
An incident at Park City Mountain in Utah left a skier briefly hanging by her boot from a Red Pine Gondola cabin around 1:00 p.m. on New Year’s Eve. Eyewitnesses said the woman attempted to board the gondola late, and the doors closed on her ski boot, according to TownLift Park City News. The outlet reported that she was carried upside down roughly 15 feet off the ground for about 50 feet before the lift was stopped.
Park City Mountain employees quickly rescued the woman using a ladder and freed her boot from the cabin door. She was unharmed, and the gondola resumed operations within five minutes, Park City Mountain spokesperson John Kanaly said. The Red Pine Gondola remained in operation the following day.
Videos of the incident briefly circulated on social media before being removed at the request of those involved. Resort officials indicated the episode appeared to be a rare boarding error rather than a mechanical failure. Modern gondolas like the Red Pine—installed in 1997 by Poma—are equipped with safety sensors to detect obstructions, though timing errors during loading can still lead to incidents.
- Related: When the Lift Stops: Inside the 2024-25 Mechanical Lift Failures Affecting the Ski Industry
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This Park City event was fortunately minor compared to other lift-related accidents this season, which has seen an unusually high number of serious mechanical failures across North America and beyond.
- This past March, a young boy fell approximately 15 feet off the Town Lift Plaza chairlift, just before the netting that prevents skiers from dropping onto Park Avenue as the chairlift crosses the street.
- A freak chairlift accident has resulted in serious injuries to a 32-year-old cook at a resort in the Italian Dolomites on Christmas Eve.
- A tragic accident at a ski resort in northern Japan claimed the life of a 5-year-old boy on December 28, after his right arm became trapped in a magic carpet ski lift, Japanese newspapers report.
- Two men were hospitalized on Monday, December 15, after a chairlift-related accident occurred at Vail Mountain, Colorado.
- A former German international soccer player, Sebastian Hertner, was killed in a chairlift accident at the Savin Kuk ski resort on Mount Durmitor in northern Montenegro on Saturday, December 20, while his wife was seriously injured.
This season has seen a greater number of lift failures and accidents than in previous years. These incidents have been occurring at a higher frequency, possibly due to the United States’ aging lift infrastructure. Although the stats and numbers show that severe incidents rarely happen, the start of the 2025-26 ski season has raised some concerns. It is important to remember to always be safe on the mountain and board lifts promptly, and follow the resort employees’ instructions.
