Vail Corp. Reaches Midtrial Deal In Wash. Ski Resort Fall Suit

Terms reached to settle negligence claims after two days of trial testimony.

Law360 (March 6, 2025) — Vail Corp. has reached a settlement to end a woman’s lawsuit over a 20-foot fall from a chairlift platform at a Washington ski resort, the parties told a Washington federal judge on Thursday, a few days into a trial that was expected to last more than a week.

Miroslava “Mirka” Lewis and Colorado-based Vail Corp. told U.S. District Judge Robert S. Lasnik on Thursday they had reached terms to settle her negligence claims after two days of trial testimony regarding the January 2022 incident at Vail-owned Stevens Pass Ski Resort, which left her with head trauma, broken bones, a punctured lung and a litany of other injuries. The details of the out-of-court settlement are confidential.

“We came to settlement terms that we’re very satisfied with, and we are happy that Mirka can put this case behind her and focus on her health and well-being,” said her attorney Robert W. Zimmerman of Saltz Mongeluzzi Bendesky PC.

A representative of Vail said the parties were “able to reach a resolution” but declined to comment further.

During opening statements on Tuesday, Lewis’ counsel said she was among the parents of the resort’s alpine team members who came to work as chairlift operators during the 2021-22 season during a staffing shortage. She was trying to mount a moving chairlift after her second shift when she was knocked from the edge of a 21-foot platform and plummeted to the ground below, Zimmerman told jurors.

Lewis argued Vail was to blame for her injuries for allowing mostly untrained parents to work the mountain after just a half-day orientation, neglecting to replace an outdated chairlift without a safety bar, and failing to install a safety net on one side of the platform that could have stopped her fall. According to her attorney, corporate inspectors had recommended replacing the lift and adding fall protection at the notorious upper platform on “Kehr’s chair,” where others had fallen before.

Brian C. Augenthaler of Keating Bucklin & McCormack Inc. PS, representing Vail, said during opening statements the fall was the result of a “miscommunication” between Lewis and the lift operator on duty. While Lewis has said the operator failed to stop the lift when she asked, the operator has said Lewis had tried to load prematurely.

Augenthaler emphasized that both Lewis and the lift operator were not employees of Vail Corp, which owns more than 40 other ski areas; they were instead employed by Stevens Pass, which Vail purchased in 2018.

Lewis filed her lawsuit in May 2023 against Vail Corp.’s parent company Vail Resorts Inc. and unnamed defendants, court records show.

In January, Judge Lasnik granted summary judgment to the parent company and other affiliates but cleared claims against Vail Corp. for trial. The judge concluded that Lewis had shown that the subsidiary “had inserted itself into the safety, lift operations, and budgeting protocols at Stevens Pass Resort to such an extent that it had a duty to take reasonable steps — or to order Stevens Pass Resort to take reasonable steps — to address the risks associated with employee downloading on the Kehr’s chair.”

Zimmerman told jurors Tuesday that Vail Corp. was hellbent on reopening lifts to reduce lines and maximizing profits from season pass holders, despite the worker shortage, when it adopted a proposal from the ski club to make parents temporary lift operators.

Augenthaler countered that Lewis wasn’t a volunteer, since she received compensation and a season pass from the resort in return for her work. He also presented a waiver she had signed acknowledging risks associated with the job, including falls or entanglements with ski lifts.

Lewis is represented by Robert W. Zimmerman, Deborah Alexander, Larry Bendesky and Samuel A. Haaz of Saltz Mongeluzzi Bendesky PC.

Vail Corp. is represented by Brian C. Augenthaler, Richard B. Jolley, Margot G. Cotter and Rakiah B. Adams of Keating Bucklin & McCormack Inc. PS.

The case is Lewis v. Vail Resorts Inc. et al., case number 2:23-cv-00812, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington.