‘Drunk’ skier dies after crashing through gondola window and falling 130ft

Man, aged 29, was impaled upon a piste marker

The man fell from a gondola in the Deux Alpes resort on Saturday at around 5pm (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

A “drunk” skier has plunged 130 feet to his death in the French Alps after crashing through the window of a gondola.

The 29-year-old and another man, aged 23, were filming themselves in the ski lift as they came down the mountain at the Deux Alpes just before it closed on Saturday evening, said Grenoble prosecutor Eric Vaillant.

During the 12-minute journey, the older man, who was 6ft 2in tall and weighed more than 100 kilograms, smashed through the plexiglass window and fell to his death.

“One option is that he was completely drunk and running for fun against the windows of the cabin,” French police told The Independent.

The Grenoble prosecutor’s office also confirmed reports that the man landed on a piste marker, and said it had asked police to investigate his death.

“Two young men aged 29 and 23, drunk, were messing around in the gondola and the 29-year-old crossed the plexiglass wall and fell 40m to death. The scene was filmed by his friend with his phone,” said Mr Vaillant, in a statement issued in French.

The gondola will be examined by investigators, Mr Vaillant said, as the resort’s director denied any responsibility for the incident.

“These cabins are designed for 20 people,” the director of the Deux Alpes resort, Fabrice Boutet, told broadcaster BFM.

Police are investigating the death in Les Deux Alpes (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

“If there’s movement caused by abrupt braking or something else, the entire cabin is designed to withstand any shocks that may occur ... this stupid accident was caused by him gaining momentum and throwing himself against the plexiglass.”

The man fell from the Jandri Express 1 ski lift, according to Grenoble-based newspaper Le Dauphiné libéré, which broke the news of the incident.

The gondola was built in 1985 and is capable of carrying up to 1,800 people an hour as it travels nearly a kilometre to a height of 2,603 metres above sea level. Les Deux Alpes is France’s highest ski resort, boasting a summit of 3,600 metres.

A total of 12 people died in the French mountains during the 2021-22 ski season, according to the French National Mountain Safety Observation System.

More than 45,000 people were treated for injuries while emergency services attended around 50,000 incidents.

Research by insurance firm Direct Line in 2019 suggested that more than 1,000 British people per day injure themselves on skiing holidays after consuming alcohol, with 3.8 million people reporting alcohol-related injuries on the slopes in the five years prior.