{"id":29240,"date":"2024-02-12T22:35:00","date_gmt":"2024-02-13T05:35:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-man-dies-while-skiing-at-purgatory-resort\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T00:52:26","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T06:52:26","slug":"durango-man-dies-while-skiing-at-purgatory-resort","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-man-dies-while-skiing-at-purgatory-resort\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango man dies while skiing at Purgatory Resort"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"A
A 73-year-old man died while skiing Monday, Feb. 12, 2024, at Purgatory Resort. A Flight For Life helicopter landed near the base of Lift 3 on the backside of the mountain as part of the response. (Courtesy of Patrick Dawson)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A 73-year-old Durango man died Monday while skiing at Purgatory Resort, according to emergency responders.<\/p>\n

La Plata County Coroner Jann Smith identified the man as Richard \u201cRick\u201d Boebel.<\/p>\n

The crash occurred about 11:20 a.m. on Lower Peace trail (an intermediate run), which is near the base of Lift 3, on the backside of the mountain, according to Purgatory Resort.<\/p>\n

\"A
A 73-year-old man died while skiing Monday, Feb. 12, 2024, at Purgatory Resort. A Flight For Life helicopter landed near the base of Lift 3 on the backside of the mountain as part of the response. (Courtesy of Patrick Dawson)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A bystander initiated CPR and ski patrollers were on scene providing medical attention within six minutes of the notification, according to Purgatory Resort. The man was eventually taken to the bottom of Lift 3, where he was loaded onto a Flight For Life helicopter.<\/p>\n

La Plata County Sheriff\u2019s Lt. Pat Downs said the man lived in Durango for about six years.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one actually saw it happen,\u201d Downs said. \u201cThey\u2019re not sure if he hit a tree or had a medical emergency that led to his death.\u201d<\/p>\n

Patrick Dawson said he was one of the first to arrive on scene and offer lifesaving efforts.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a pulse for a little while but we kept losing it,\u201d said Dawson, who is an OB\/GYN from Milwaukee visiting on a ski vacation.<\/p>\n

Dawson said it was difficult to know what happened, but from the looks of the situation he suspects Dawson suffered a medical emergency.<\/p>\n

\u201cI suspect that had a medical episode, crashed to the ground and kind of busted his face a little bit in the crash, but the crash was secondary to whatever happened,\u201d Dawson said.<\/p>\n

According to The Durango Herald <\/em>archives, Boebel was active with Seniors Outdoors and was preparing to ride the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic from Durango to Silverton in 2021.<\/p>\n

\"Bill
Bill Babcock, left, and Rick Boebel lead a group of Seniors Outdoors riders May 6, 2021, up County Road 203 as they get their legs in shape for the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald file)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cThe entire Purgatory Resort community sends its deepest sympathy and support to the family and friends of the skier involved in this tragic accident,\u201d the resort said in a statement emailed to the Herald<\/em>.<\/p>\n

It was at least the second skier death<\/a> this year at Purgatory Resort.<\/p>\n

On Jan. 5, Kenneth \u201cGreg\u201d Riddle, 64, died near the intersection of Sa\u2019s Psyche (a beginner run) and El Diablo (an intermediate run) on the front side of the mountain. Skiers found him unresponsive, and it did not appear as if he hit anything.<\/p>\n

shane@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Unknown if man hit tree or suffered some other medical emergency<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29241,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[255,1152,28,712],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-29240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-death-and-dying","tag-emergency-incident","tag-headlines","tag-purgatory"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29240"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29240\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80681,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29240\/revisions\/80681"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29240"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=29240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}