Breckenridge Lift Evacuation

[Nick]

Ski Stef, didn't get stuck on this did you? :smash:

http://www.firsttracksonline.com/20...ine/pDno+(First+Tracks!!+Online+Ski+Magazine)

Was the Peak 8 Super Connect

Resort officials report that it took two hours and 45 minutes to complete the evacuation following the 1:30 p.m. incident aboard the lift that connects the base of Peak 9 with the Vista Haus restaurant area on the upper mountain of the popular Colorado resort’s Peak 8.

 

[jimmywilson69]

That lift is super long, including a mid-station for loading. I'm suprised to see that an evac only took 2 hours.

 

[ski stef]

Nope, I managed to avoid this somehow!

 

[drjeff]

That lift is super long, including a mid-station for loading. I'm suprised to see that an evac only took 2 hours.

Reguardless of a lift's length, most ski patrols/ski areas will have a "target time" of 2hrs tops to evac an entire lift. I'm guessing that Breck had atleast 10 teams(and probably more than that) working to evac that lift. What makes that 2hr mark even more impressive if you think about it, is that by the time the incident happen, the lift ops crew got there and figured out that this WASN'T a situation where they could get the lift atleast restarted safely to unload the folks on it, and then got the word out to the rest of the mountain ops and patrol folks that it would need to be evac'd, and then the teams got there with their gear for the evac, it was probably a good 30 minutes from when the lift stopped to when the 1st guests were getting evac'd!

There's just so much stuff that a mountain does behind the scenes to get ready for so many scenarios that most ski area guests will never know of and or appreciate!

 

[jimmywilson69]

Good points DrJeff. There is a portion of that lift that is fairly remote, as in there aren't any trails that cross it. So to have everyone off of it within 3 hours is pretty impressive.

 

[skiNEwhere]

breck actually has an abandoned lift by the superconnect and C-chair that they use exclusively for practicing lift evacs

 

[Madroch]

The article says only about 40 skiers evacuated-- if accurate, that makes the 2 hrs 45 somewhat less impressive. A lengthy high speed quad could have many more than that to be evacuated...