Broomfield spent thirty years annexing across four county lines and then became its own city and county in 2001, in part to stop answering to four separate court districts. A ski claim is one of the few matters that still leaves town, because the court that hears it follows the resort and the injury rather than your street address. We bring Colorado Ski Safety Act claims from our Denver office at 2701 Lawrence St., and there is no fee unless we win.
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Colorado wrote a statute specifically for the slopes. The Ski Safety Act of 1979, at C.R.S. 33-44-101 and following, sets out what a resort owes the public, what a skier owes everyone around them, and which hazards the law treats as simply part of the sport.
The Act's central move is to define a category of danger nobody pays for. C.R.S. 33-44-103 lists the inherent risks, and they are broad: changing weather, snow and ice conditions, bare spots, rocks and stumps, collisions with lift towers and their components, and the effects of terrain and steepness. Get hurt by one of those and the statute stands in the way of a claim.
What the Act does not do is excuse a resort from its own obligations, and it does not excuse the person who ran into you. Those two openings are where most viable ski cases live. Reading which side of the line your injury falls on is the first thing we do, and it usually turns on facts that stop being available within days.
A note on scope, because the Act is often described loosely. The statute keys on a "ski area" and on sliding downhill or jumping on snow or ice. Its definitions do not sort resorts by discipline, and the Act contains no helmet rule for any age group.
Every ski case turns on one question before it turns on any other. Was the thing that hurt you a risk the sport carries, or a failure the operator is answerable for?
The line is not always obvious from the lift line. A tower strike sounds inherent and often is, but a tower with missing padding where padding was required is a different case. That distinction is worth a phone call before anyone assumes the answer.
If a person hit you, the Act helps rather than hinders. C.R.S. 33-44-109(1) states plainly that a collision with another skier is neither an inherent risk nor a risk a skier assumes in an action between skiers. That sentence removes the defense a careless skier would most like to use.
Every skier must maintain enough control to avoid objects and people. The statute puts the primary duty on the person skiing downhill to avoid colliding with anyone below them, which is why uphill position matters so much in reconstructing a crash.
Skiers must observe posted signs and warnings, and must stay off closed terrain. A run marked closed is closed.
A skier entering a trail, starting downhill, or merging from the side must yield to traffic already on the run.
Skis and boards need a device capable of stopping runaway equipment. A loose ski that strikes someone below is not an act of nature.
No one may ski while so impaired by alcohol or a controlled substance that they endanger themselves or others. And a skier involved in a collision that injures someone may not leave the scene before giving their name and address, unless they are leaving to get help.
The penalty structure was rewritten and older reproductions of the Act still circulate with the wrong version. As the statute reads now, violating the subsections on posted signs, yielding when entering a run, or the runaway-equipment requirement is a civil infraction carrying a fine of up to $1,000. Leaving the scene of an injury collision is treated differently and is a petty offense.
Fault is then apportioned. Under C.R.S. 13-21-111 an injured person recovers only if their own negligence was not as great as the negligence of the party they are suing. Reach half the fault and recovery is gone entirely, which is why an early and unflattering fault narrative is worth contesting the moment it appears.
Almost every ticket, season pass, and rental agreement in Colorado carries release language, and almost every injured skier assumes it is the end of the conversation. It usually is not.
A release is a contract, and Colorado courts read it as one. It has to be clear, it has to be unambiguous, and it only reaches what it actually describes. Broad language written to cover ordinary negligence does not stretch to cover conduct the law treats as worse than careless.
That limit matters more than the signature does. A waiver does not shield willful and wanton conduct, recklessness, or gross negligence. Where a resort ignored a known hazard, skipped a required inspection, or ran equipment it knew was faulty, the release stops being the obstacle it appears to be.
Parents should know the rule that applies to them. Under C.R.S. 13-22-107, a parent may release a child's prospective claim for negligence, but that authority does not extend to willful and wanton, reckless, or grossly negligent acts. A child hurt by that kind of conduct is not signed away.
Bring the paperwork to the consultation rather than deciding on it alone. What the document covers is a legal question, and it is answered by reading it against what actually happened.
Broomfield is a consolidated city and county, a status it took on for administrative rather than ceremonial reasons. Decades of annexation had pushed the city across Boulder, Adams, Jefferson, and Weld counties, leaving residents dealing with four county governments, four sales tax bases, and four court districts at once. Consolidation took effect on November 15, 2001 and collapsed that into one.
Today Broomfield sits in the 17th Judicial District, which it shares with Adams County, and the Broomfield Combined Courts are at 17 DesCombes Drive. Here is the part that surprises people: a ski claim is one of the matters that will usually not be heard there. Venue follows the resort and the injury, so a crash at a mountain in Summit, Eagle, or Boulder county is generally litigated where the mountain is. The city ended its own four-district problem and a ski case still leaves town.
UCHealth Broomfield Hospital on Destination Drive handles emergency presentations locally. Serious trauma from a mountain injury is routed to a designated trauma center rather than treated close to home, and Intermountain Health Good Samaritan in Lafayette is one of the Level II centers in this part of the metro. Records therefore tend to arrive in pieces, from a resort clinic, from a transporting service, and from the receiving hospital. Assembling that chain early matters, because it is the record on which the injury is proved.
Broomfield skiers leave in two directions. US-36 runs northwest toward Boulder and on through the canyon to Eldora, and the Boulder Turnpike to I-25 and I-70 sends everyone else toward the Summit and Eagle county resorts. Which way you drove is not a legal fact, but it is often the first thing that identifies which county's court will see the case.
Where negligence is proved, Colorado recognizes two kinds of loss: the ones with a paper trail, and the ones without.
Recovery from a ski area operator runs into a statutory ceiling. C.R.S. 33-44-113 fixes it at $1,000,000 in present value overall, with $250,000 limits on a derivative claim brought by someone else and on non-economic loss. Four qualifications sit inside that rule and each one matters.
Two years is the working number, but which statute supplies it depends on who you are suing.
Cases resolve on better terms when the other side has reason to believe the file will be tried rather than traded.
The Ski Safety Act, the inherent-risk defense, and resort release language do not behave like an ordinary negligence claim, and a lawyer meeting them for the first time is learning on your file.
Grooming records, lift maintenance logs, incident reports, patrol statements, and signage photographs all decay or disappear. Early preservation letters exist for that reason.
The consultation costs nothing and our fee comes out of a recovery.
Denver at 2701 Lawrence St. is a short run down US-36, and we come to you when travel is the problem.
You describe the day. We tell you honestly whether there is a claim, including when there is not.
Letters go out to the resort for lift logs, grooming records, incident reports, and any video, before those records cycle out.
We locate witnesses, obtain patrol and clinic documentation, and where the mechanism is contested, retain reconstruction help.
We collect the full treatment record and, for serious injury, work with treating physicians and life care planners on what recovery actually requires.
The claim is presented with the evidence assembled, not as an estimate.
If the offer does not reflect the harm, we file in the proper venue and prepare the case for trial.
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Usually not. Venue in a ski injury case generally follows the resort and the injury rather than the plaintiff's home address, so a crash at a mountain in another county is typically litigated there. Living in Broomfield does not limit where you can bring a claim, and it does not require you to travel for most of the process either.
Not necessarily. A release is read as a contract and reaches only what it clearly describes. It does not cover willful and wanton conduct, recklessness, or gross negligence, and a parent cannot sign away a child's claim for that category of conduct. Bring the document and we will read it against the facts.
It helps. C.R.S. 33-44-109(1) says a skier-versus-skier collision is neither an inherent risk nor a risk assumed by a skier in an action between them, and the statute places the primary duty to avoid a collision on the person skiing downhill.
Two years, but from different statutes depending on the defendant. Against a ski area operator or its employees the source is C.R.S. 33-44-111. Against another skier it is C.R.S. 13-80-102(1)(a). The clock generally starts when both the injury and its cause are known or reasonably should have been.
Against a ski area operator, yes. C.R.S. 33-44-113 caps recovery at $1,000,000 present value, with $250,000 limits on derivative claims and non-economic loss. Injuries to a passenger riding a chairlift are excluded from the cap, the cap does not apply to a claim against another skier, and a court may allow more on good cause shown for excess future earnings or future medical costs.
The Ski Safety Act contains no helmet requirement at any age. Wearing one is a good idea and its absence is not what decides a claim.
You can still recover, as long as your share of the negligence stays below the other party's. At half or more, C.R.S. 13-21-111 bars recovery altogether, which is why how fault is characterized early on carries real weight.
Nothing up front. The consultation is free and we are paid only out of a recovery.
It's More Than Money.
Call (303) 209-9395 or request a free case review. No fee unless we win.
CGH Injury Lawyers · 2701 Lawrence St., Suite 201, Denver, CO 80205
