Telluride Ski Patrol votes to strike, resort set to close Saturday68%
By Mead Gruver0% Associated Press66%
12/24/2025, 8:06:29 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 16 faulty reasoning types, including Appeal to Emotion, Ad Hominem, and Self-Serving Bias, with Framing Effect as the most egregious example at 15.7% saturation with 61 hits. Analysis detected 511 faulty-reasoning hits from 388 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 61.8% and a BS Rank of 68% (5,472 of 16,813 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 67.50% of the article peer group.
By Mead Gruver, Associated Press
Telluride, one of the best-known ski resorts in the Western U.S., plans to close in the coming days due to a labor dispute between its owner and the ski patrol union.
The Telluride Professional Ski Patrol Association voted Tuesday to strike on Saturday after contract negotiations since June failed to yield an agreement on pay.
With no more talks planned before the weekend, Telluride Ski Resort said it will not open that day.
“We are concerned that any organization, particularly one that exists to help people, would do something that will have such a devastating effect on our community,” owner Chuck Horning said Wednesday in a statement.
It was not immediately clear whether the closure will last longer.
Resort officials were working on a plan to reopen even if the strike continues, according to the statement.
The patrollers are seeking to be paid more in line with their counterparts at other resorts in the region.
The union wants starting pay to rise from $21 to $28 per hour, and for wages for patrollers with more than 30 years of experience to increase from $30-$36 per hour to $39-$48.60 per hour.
While resort officials sought to lay blame for the impending closure on the union, Andy Dennis, interim safety director and spokesperson for patrollers’ association, said it lies with Horning.
“He’s being a bully.
This is what bullies do, take their toys and run,” Dennis said.
All he has to do is give us a fair contract, and this would all be over.”
Ski patrollers sometimes argue for more pay on the grounds that the cost of living is high in ski towns and they are responsible for people's safety.
Patrollers' duties include attending to injured skiers and the controlled release of avalanches with explosives when nobody is in range.
Even without a strike, Telluride has yet to get going fully this season, with unusually warm weather meaning just 20 of the resort's 149 trails have been able to open.
Patrollers around the Rocky Mountain region have been voting on unionizing recently.
Last year, an almost two-week strike closed many runs and caused long lift lines at Utah's Park City Mountain Resort.
That strike ended when Colorado-based Vail Resorts acceded to demands including a $2-an-hour base pay increase and raises for senior ski patrollers.
Analysis
Hover over highlighted words in the article to view the associated bias or fallacy analysis.