Section 225-A:24 Responsibilities of Skiers and Passengers.
It is hereby recognized that, regardless of all safety measures which may be taken by the ski area operator, skiing, snowboarding, snow tubing, and snowshoeing as sports, and the use of passenger tramways associated therewith may be hazardous to the skiers or passengers. Therefore:
I. Each person who participates in the sport of skiing, snowboarding, snow tubing, and snowshoeing accepts as a matter of law, the dangers inherent in the sport, and to that extent may not maintain an action against the operator for any injuries which result from such inherent risks, dangers, or hazards. The categories of such risks, hazards, or dangers which the skier or passenger assumes as a matter of law include but are not limited to the following: variations in terrain, surface or subsurface snow or ice conditions; bare spots; rocks, trees, stumps and other forms of forest growth or debris; terrain, lift towers, and components thereof (all of the foregoing whether above or below snow surface); pole lines and plainly marked or visible snow making equipment; collisions with other skiers or other persons or with any of the categories included in this paragraph.
II. Each skier and passenger shall have the sole responsibility for knowing the range of his or her own ability to negotiate any slope, trail, terrain, or passenger tramway. Any passenger who boards such tramway shall be presumed to have sufficient knowledge, abilities, and physical dexterity to negotiate the lift, and no liability shall attach to any operator or attendant for failure to instruct persons on the use thereof.
III. Each skier or passenger shall conduct himself or herself, within the limits of his or her own ability, maintain control of his or her speed and course at all times both on the ground and in the air, while skiing, snowboarding, snow tubing, and snowshoeing heed all posted warnings, and refrain from acting in a manner which may cause or contribute to the injury of himself, herself, or others.
IV. Each passenger shall be the sole judge of his ability to negotiate any uphill track, and no action shall be maintained against any operator by reason of the condition of said track unless the board, upon appropriate evidence furnished to it, makes a finding that the condition of the track, at the time and place of an accident, did not meet the board's requirements, provided however, that the ski area operator shall have had notice, prior to the accident, of the board's requirements the violation of which is claimed to be the basis for any action by the passenger.
V. No skier, passenger or other person shall:
(a) Embark or disembark upon a passenger tramway except at designated areas.
(b) Throw or drop any object while riding on a passenger tramway nor do any act or thing which shall interfere with the running of said tramway.
(c) Engage in any type of conduct which will contribute to cause injury to any other person nor shall he willfully place any object in the uphill ski track which may cause another to fall, while riding in a passenger tramway.
(d) Ski or otherwise use a slope or trail which has been designated ""closed'' by the operator without written permission of said operator or designee.
(e) Remove, alter, deface or destroy any sign or notice placed in the ski area or on the trail board by the operator.
(f) Cross the uphill track of a J bar, T bar, rope tow, wire rope, or similar device except at locations approved by the board.
(g) Ski or otherwise access terrain outside open and designated ski trails and slopes or beyond ski area boundaries without written permission of said operator or designee.
Source. 1965, 241:2. 1969, 414:1. 1978, 13:5. 1987, 124:6, I(b). 1988, 151:14, eff. June 20, 1988. 2005, 145:4, 5, eff. July 1, 2005.