On Thursday afternoon a chairlift accident occurred in the Kleine Scheidegg ski region. One person, a German national, was killed and three others injured. The cause of the accident is currently under investigation.
Tha accident happened at 12.50 h on the Fallboden chairlift. According to initial knowledge, the cable slipped off the roller unit at a pylon. The cableway personnel began to evacuate guests 15 minutes later. The three injured persons were flown to hospital. The rescue was completed 90 minutes later, with a total of 75 persons evacuated.
The cause of the accident is under investigation. The authorities will issue further information as soon as this is available. The wind conditions on Thursday were partly gusty. The Fallboden chairlift is fitted with a wind-measuring system. At 40 km/h a warning is signalled, at 60 km/h an alarm is given. The wind conditions were regionally very varied and for this reason it is impossible to determine the exact situation at Fallboden at the time of the accident.
The Fallboden chairlift received its first concession in 1982. In 2002 the chairlift was converted from a three-seater to a two-seater chairlift. In 2002 the Swiss Federal Office of Transport (FOT) granted a concession valid to 31 October 2022. In 2005, the operational licence was also extended until 2022.
Jungfrau Railways are profoundly shocked at the accident. We offer our deepest sympathy to the relatives of the person who was killed. We wish those injured a speedy recovery.
The cable derailed from a mast during a windstorm peaking 90km/h and fell down with the chairs.
The accident happened in the Swiss ski resort of Kleine Scheidegg.
At 12:50 pm on January 3, a ski chairlift ride cost a German skier's life and another German woman was left with serious injuries after the lift cable derailed from the mast sheaves in a windstorm. The derailed chairlift is the two-seater Fallboden lift at Kleine Scheidegg, next to the Jungfrau mountain in Switzerland. 

Two more Australian tourists were lightly injured. About 20 further people had to be evacuated from the stopped chairlift. Wind velocity peaking at 90km/h prevented a helicopter from rescuing the trapped passengers, complicating the rescue. 

According to 20min.ch, the lift was manufactured by Garaventa AG, a major Swiss ski lift company, now a part of an international group Doppelmayr/Garaventa. When contacted no one was available for comment.

Shortly before the accident, a wind alarm was activated few times by a 60km/h wind. The operator decided to close the lift and waited for the lift to unload all passengers; at the moment of the catastrophe the bottom station of the lift was already closed, but 75 passengers were still on the lift.

According to the Swiss law, every chair lift must be designed to withstand a lateral wind load of 250 newtons (approx. 25kg) per square meter. However there is no law limit at which wind speed or lateral loads the chair lifts have to be stopped. This safety aspect is left to the responsibility of the operator. The safety of the lift was checked by the Swiss Federal Office of Transport in January 2006. This chairlift accident is said to be the worst in Switzerland for the last 8 years.