Roughly 15 years ago, I was contacted by a Vermont ski area for assistance. Without getting into too much detail, there had been a strange, fatal premise incident, late at night. It didn’t involve the resort’s operations. They needed help in managing media interest.

Fatalities at ski areas almost invariably involve law enforcement to some degree. So one of the first people I got in touch with was the public information officer (PIO) of the Vermont State Police (VSP), which was the controlling legal authority in that area. My goal, on behalf of the ski area, was to ensure that any press statements made on its behalf were squarely in line and consistent with information being released by law enforcement.

The VSP PIO was somewhat surprised we had reached out, but grateful we did. We quickly established a solid, mutually beneficial working relationship. We ran all resort statements past her for approval, and were allowed to see their statements just prior to those releases being sent to media outlets, which enabled us to be ready with answers to potential questions from reporters.

All of this made it possible to manage the story in complete alignment, ensuring that the story was over and done with promptly.

Relationships matter. This story illustrates a key point: When you’re dealing with bad news, it’s not just what you know—it’s also who you know that matters. In this day and age, when AI and other tools can help us semi-automate communications, there’s still nothing like good old-fashioned relationships when the fur is flying. Develop these relationships with your local PIOs now, if you haven’t already. If you don’t know who these people are, find out what agencies comprise your local emergency response teams and start introducing yourself.

A Word About NIMS

Your ski patrol almost certainly knows about ICS—the Incident Command System. It’s part of the broader National Incident Management System (NIMS), a federal emergency management process used by law enforcement, first responders, medical centers, academic institutions receiving federal dollars, and a variety of for-profit, not-for-profit, and other organizations. It’s a straightforward platform that works well, and federal, state, and local governments are required by law to use it. If your resort isn’t using it system-wide, it would be a good idea to look into it.

Public communications under ICS is a core function of emergency response. And technically, your local first response agencies can actually do some fairly limiting things to your operation—even to the point of temporarily shutting you down and clearing the premises if they deem that necessary to manage the situation. At minimum, it’s helpful to understand that. And if you embrace it, it can be helpful.

First Response Agencies

When you’ve got an incident serious enough that first responders are called to your mountain, the first concerns of all involved need to be, 1) to ensure that the situation doesn’t get worse, and 2) to operationally manage the emergency. Some incidents can be managed without these agencies—most ski areas wouldn’t need the local fire department to help with a chairlift evacuation, for example. But others, such as a base lodge fire, require them. The larger and more serious the incident, the more agencies are likely to become involved. 

Know who’s in charge. ICS offers a structure for Joint Incident Command with exactly this in mind—with a caveat. Generally, incident command will remain with the primary authority for the area of operation and incident type. So that base lodge fire will have the fire department running command, even if law enforcement is involved. With significant law enforcement matters, if your local law enforcement is run by the county sheriff’s office, that office will likely hold command even if the state police or other local law enforcement agencies are in support. Your key contact, from a public information standpoint, is likely to be the assigned PIO from the sheriff’s office.

In truly large incidents, joint command protocols will be in place. But with most incidents at ski areas, formal joint command usually isn’t necessary, even if different agencies are involved. That’s where things can get a little more complex for your resort’s comms team. The cops are one thing; fire/EMS are generally separate agencies, with their own PIO(s). An incident involving them and law enforcement brings a second agency PIO into the picture. Heaven forbid that your situation is bad enough that the FBI gets involved.

Where your ski area is located—and the agencies potentially involved—matters a lot. Ski areas in small, rural areas may find that there’s one PIO for the fire department, one for law enforcement, or the senior officer on duty may be assigned the role. Some areas have one PIO for their entire township or city, and that individual manages all communications for all of that town’s agencies. On the other side of the coin, Salt Lake County in Utah—which has regionally-coordinated law enforcement and fire/rescue services—has PIOs for each agency. Those people tend to stay in that role for only a year or two. That means you need to be aware when there’s a change, and make new relationships on a fairly regular basis.

Stay current. This is why you should have a list of agencies and their PIOs, with 24-hour access via cell and email—and why it’s important to keep those lists updated, at least annually. It calls for shoe leather on the part of your comms team: They need to establish the relationships long before anything happens, and maintain those relationships. A cup of coffee or a lunch date once in a while is smart. It’s also smart to invite these individuals to tabletop or mockup disaster drills. They’ll be pleased with the invitation.

Can you get ahead of the PIO? The challenging part is that these agencies tend to be slow to release information while a situation is still being actively managed. Meantime, your resort’s comms team is being pummeled with demands for information from news media, social media, and stakeholders.

This is why it’s so important to develop and maintain relationships with the PIOs of relevant agencies that might get involved in your incident. They might not be ready to release anything themselves, but you can at least run drafts of your proposed outbound communications past them for their review. They may ask you to withhold certain information. But if you can get the agency PIO’s agreement with your messaging, you can generally release with a good degree of assurance, and in a reasonably timely manner.

At minimum, you can establish the relationship with the PIO(s) in such a manner as to pledge to involve them, but with the understanding that sometimes, your communications needs require faster turnaround than theirs, and that while you’ll do everything you can to let them in the loop, you may need to release things before they approve. They’ll understand. But it’s best to work with them if you can. During the incident mentioned at the top, the VSP only requested one bit of information be deleted from a planned wrap-up release—the name of the deceased. Their reason: they hadn’t finished family notifications. 

So, Who Else?

It’s not just the PIOs of first response agencies that matter. A well-thought through emergency communications plan (ECP) will include other individuals who you may need to contact for assistance.

Risk management advisers. Your attorney and insurance carrier, and PR agency if you have one, are obvious ones to include. But there may be others from whom you may need assistance or information in the event of an incident.

Suppliers and contractors. Consider the company or companies that built your lifts (or who now stock parts for them). If you work with an independent lift engineer, as many smaller ski areas do, that individual should be easy to contact. 

Similarly, if your trail network was designed by an active resort design firm, you might need them. Ditto for engineering and architectural firms who designed your buildings and roadways. If you have water impoundments on your property, you should consider the engineering firms responsible for the design/build of those as well.

State inspection agencies. If your state has a tramway board and/or lift inspector, your comms team should have access to information on how to contact that individual. Same for the local or state agency that inspects and certifies your F&B operations.

Internal Personnel

Pretty much everyone cited above is external to your resort. But there are internal resources you should identify as well.

A well-crafted ECP identifies human and physical resources you might need to handle communications related to a significant event. Those communications aren’t limited to news and social media. Consider identifying point persons for the following roles:

Staff communications: Someone needs to keep your team up to speed.

Guest communications: Someone needs to oversee communication with guests, and ensure that front-line personnel are provided with approved messaging.

Family support: Incidents involving separation, injury, or death require highly sensitive and empathetic staff members to provide frantic families and friends with support, food, quiet spaces, and potentially lodging and transportation.

Switchboard supervision: Nothing will anger people faster than needing to speak with someone at the resort and getting shoveled into a voicemail system. To the extent possible, live answers are a good idea, provided by team members who can triage calls and get them to the right people.

There are other potential roles, depending upon your resort’s parameters. And it’s important to not only identify the leads in those roles, but also their backups—and then train them in what they might need to do. The goal of an ECP is to put as many aspects of incident management as possible on autopilot, so that you can focus on critical-path decisions that are situationally dependent.

Knowing who’s going to do what, long before anything happens, helps you do that.

SAMMY Guest Editor says…

When something goes wrong, managing the crisis itself is only part of the puzzle. The people involved become the most critical aspect of a correct response, as Skip discusses here. Depending on the situation, a multitude of outside agencies and organizations may be involved, or it may just be guests and employees that need honest and clear information. 

Too many times, our industry hides behind boilerplate statements written by and for lawyers. What we lose is the human touch, the very differentiator that sets the ski industry apart from everyone else. From a lift incident to road closures to true conditions updates, transparency and honesty are always the best policy. Without clear and transparent communication, doubt forms and words have no meaning anymore because the audience does not trust our message. 

In crisis situations, everything you’ve done as an organization leading up to that moment will determine how successful you are in managing the message. 

With the Davis Fire at Mt. Rose’s doorstep in September 2024, it was too late to build relationships over a coffee—we had to spring into action and rely on the relationships we had already established. A key reminder is to be human and to remember that you are dealing with humans on the other side, even if interacting with multiple government agencies, all with reporting layers and political games.

Even in situations like that, the most important stakeholder in a communication plan remains the employee. Our people are the most directly impacted by any emergency situation—and have the most opportunity to influence the message being shared. An established culture of trust will ensure they support that message.

More broadly, a strong, supportive community that believes the ski area is an important and valuable part of its fabric will also support the message being relayed—and that includes members of the local agencies Skip discusses in his article. Overall, it’s a good reminder to focus on executing the basics and not forget the most important part: our people. 

— Greg Gavrilets, General Manager, Mt. Rose – Ski Tahoe, Nev.

2025 SAMMY Leadership Award Honoree