Ski Safety Blog

It has been a good ski season in Colorado! Record snowfall helped boost the number of visits to Colorado ski areas to about 5.54 million visits in January and February. Ski areas have enjoyed a 6.7 percent increase from the same period a year ago and puts Colorado on track to exceed last year's record for skier visits.

The season got off to a slow start because of a dry spell in November, but since then, the mountains have been hit by storms that have dumped several feet of snow. The falling value of the dollar and favorable exchange rate has also attracted international visitors, particularly from Europe where natural snow is difficult to find on the ski slopes.

Posted by Linda Chalat at 03:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

If you drive much in Colorado, then you know we have specialty plates for just about any group or cause you can think of, from College Alumni to Colorado Pioneer's, Firefighters, Breast Cancer Awareness, and Military Service designs, specialty plates of all types are available to residents of our great state. Except for the ski enthusiast!

Over the past several seasons many drivers have expressed their desire to have a skiing/riding license plate. Colorado Ski USA claims to have received hundreds of requests and suggestions for a Ski license plate because skiing and riding are a part of the Colorado culture. To make this dream a reality Colorado Ski Country is sponsoring a petition to the Colorado Department of Revenue to start offering a Colorado skiing/riding-centric license plate. To do so, they need to show that there is enough interest for the state to consider the petition.

If you wish to support the effort then click here and complete the form, expressing your interest in such a specialty plate. You are simply requesting that the Department of Revenue create such a plate for everyone who loves to ski and ride in our great state. This form is only a request to the Department of Revenue and you are not making any commitment to buy a ski-centric plate, if and when they become available.

The license plate above is a sample design that will be submitted to the Department of Revenue along with the petition. The Department of Revenue retains overall discretion with regard to the final plate design, so this may not be what the actual plate will look like when it is made available.

Posted by Linda Chalat at 04:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

It has become all too common on the slopes, the “near miss” where a skier or snow boarder out of control narrowly avoids a collision, either with fellow skiers, lift lines or trees. If there is no accident, how to control this reckless behavior to reduce the likelihood of the eventual catastrophe? Or if a collision occurs, what duty is there for the colliding skier to stay at the scene of the accident?

The Park City Council, in Park City, Utah, today will consider a law that will make it a class B misdemeanor if someone is caught skiing or snowboarding recklessly, the same severity of crime as drunken driving. Class B misdemeanors are punishable by six months in jail and a $1,000 fine.

The City Councilors also are expected to make a law barring skiers and snowboarders from going into sections of mountain resorts that are closed. The City Councilors have invested time over several months in considering the new laws.

The law as written defines reckless skiing or snowboarding as endangering "the life, limb, or property of any person," and it says people must not "display a wanton disregard for other persons or property." The law provides that skiers and snowboarders have the "primary duty" to avoid collisions with people or objects downhill from them, much like the language in the Colorado Ski Safety Act.

The law also requires skiers or snowboarders involved in collisions to stop and help injured people, and it makes people give their name, address and phone number to a ski patroller or other resort worker before leaving the scene.

Summit County and Wasatch County also plan to consider reckless-skiing laws this week. The laws in the counties would probably be similar to the one in Park City.

The law would apply to Park City Mountain Resort and Deer Valley Resort. The Canyons is not within the city limits, and Summit County laws would regulate the Snyderville Basin resort. Summit County also plans to tighten an existing rule regulating reckless skiing.

Posted by Linda Chalat at 11:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)