CANTON, Mass. — Blue Hills Ski Area in Canton is reopening on Sunday at 8 a.m. after briefly closing for a state inspection on the chair lifts. On Saturday afternoon the facility posted to Facebook that the Recreational Tramway Board had reviewed reports and deemed the lifts safe.
The ski area was closed all day on Saturday. It comes after a malfunction on Thursday that left dozens of skiers stranded in freezing cold temperatures for several hours.
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On Monday, a 7-year-old boy fell from his chairlift and had to be air-lifted to a nearby hospital, although it was unclear how the accident happened.
“It doesn’t surprise me because the ski lift is very old,” said skier Robert Bekkers of Dorchester. “I remember going up and there’s always some metal pieces and it shakes a little and it’s not steady. It has bumps and stops very often.”
Bekkers was one of the many skiers who tried to hit the slopes on Saturday, only to find Blue Hills closed. Carloads of people wound up heading home.
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“I haven’t seen snow before, being in Florida forever, so this was the first time I planned a trip to see snow and do skiing,” explained Prathyusha Ravi of West Palm Beach, Fla.
Ravi told Boston 25 News that she had taken the weekend off work so she could fly up to Massachusetts and try out skiing for the first time.
“I came here, and I made a reservation online and unfortunately it was closed, but I didn’t know it was closed because my reservation was there for today,” she said, disappointed. “This is the only day I took a holiday and came here to go skiing and I couldn’t do it today.”
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For Dorchester resident Anne Ku, skiing at Blue Hills would have been a first, but she was overall thankful that the state was doing a maintenance inspection.
“I think safety is paramount. I wouldn’t go up unless I feel super safe,” she said.
Cox Media Group