The incident took place at the Alpine Springs chairlift at Snowmass Ski Area. Photo: Werdna // Wikimedia Commons
An Australian family is suing Aspen Skiing co. over the injury of their seven-year-old son, after the boy fell 25 feet from a chairlift at the Snowmass Ski Area in Colorado in January.
As Aspen Daily News reports, the lawsuit describes how the Quigley family was riding the resort’s Alpine Springs chairlift on January 12, when their seven-year-old son slipped out of his seat. The boy was left dangling as his father, Shaun Quigley, held on to him to prevent him from falling. When the lift was eventually stopped, 20-30 seconds later, Shaun was unable to keep his grasp on the boy, who fell 24 feet to the ground. According to the lawsuit, he broke his pelvis in multiple places, suffered a concussion and used a wheelchair for several weeks following the incident.
The Quigley family claims the incident was the result of gross negligence on the part of the lift operator and attendant, who they say were not paying attention as their son was improperly loaded into the lift. In a SkiCo report filed after the incident and quoted in the suit, the lift attendant stated he was distracted by a guest from the group following the Quigleys. On top of that, the suit alleges that the operator appeared “to be drinking from a bottle and doing other non-essential activities like changing music inside the lift shack at the time the Quigleys loaded the chair and the incident occurred.” The rest of the report says the operator “was inside changing songs, came out, heard screaming, saw hanging kid, hit stop, ran around back of shack, saw kid fall, ran up to check if he was OK, dad was [hysterical] trying to get off chair, ran back to shack, called office, called patrol, cleared line, waited for patrol and supervisor.”
In response, SkiCo lawyers wrote that “ASC generally denies the allegations of the Complaint and Plaintiff’s entitlement to the relief requested therein. Plaintiff’s Complaint contains inaccurate statements and portrayals of the facts underlying the subject incident, and Plaintiff’s claim for relief is inconsistent with the medical records and other documents which Plaintiff has made available to ASC as of the date of this filing.”
The Quigleys are demanding a trial by jury and compensation for all “economic and non-economic damages and losses, including but not limited to pain, suffering, discomfort, impairment, disfigurement, loss of enjoyment of life, mental distress, medical expenses and other incidental and consequential damages and expenses.”
