Our Record of Success

DBS Successfully Enforces Agreement Between Ski Facility and Skier

After obtaining summary judgment on behalf of its client, DBS successfully defended the victory on appeal. The plaintiff sued the defendant ski facility for negligence after sustaining injuries when he collided with a snowmaking machine. Moving for summary judgment, the ski facility argued that an exculpatory agreement between the parties released the ski facility from liability for the plaintiff’s ski-related injuries. The trial court granted the motion.

On appeal, the plaintiff argued that, despite reading and signing the agreement, it had not sufficiently put him on notice of the risk of crashing into a snowmaking machine located off to the side of the ski slope. The Appellate Court, Fourth District, disagreed. The court held the agreement unambiguously informed the plaintiff of the risk of the very injury he experienced. According to the agreement: “everyone on [the] property . . . may encounter risks which include but are not limited to: collisions with others (whether participants or not) or with objects (whether marked or unmarked and whether padded or unpadded) such as . . . snowmaking equipment.” Rejecting the plaintiff’s argument that he could not have foreseen colliding with the snowmaking machine that he did, the appellate court held that the agreement need only warn of the type of danger, not the precise location of every possible source of injury. Thus, the appellate court held that the plaintiff’s injuries from the snowmaking machine were foreseeable as a matter of law.