These latter forces had been winning in the court of public (if not legal) opinion, since most Vail citizens, and quite a few outsiders, viewed the controversial Category III expansion as confirmation of their fears that, despite its protests to the contrary, VA would continue to do what a well-run corporation always does: grow. To the casual participant, the players were cleanly cut cardboard figures: the natty and rapacious VA executives versus the scruffy but noble environmentalists. In the weeks before the fires, life in Vail had been much easier, the moral universe neatly painted in bold - if simplistic - strokes of black and white. Extra measures were taken to protect high-ranking VA executives, and an outside security firm that specialized in eco-sabotage was quietly placed on retainer. Still, with opening day only a week away and the 1999 World Alpine Ski Championships scheduled for January, VA was worried that its wonderland locale would become better known for its perils than its powder. When a briefcase was found abandoned near the Lionshead base area that morning, a bomb squad was quickly dispatched after some gentle ministrations by an officer in a bulky Kevlar suit, it was discovered to contain a typewriter. “For your safety and convenience, we strongly advise skiers to choose other destinations.”Ī second ELF communiqué arrived on Halloween, heralding the weeklong “International Earth Liberation Nights,” a time to “target those who are destroying this planet and our lives.” Understandably, this put VA even more on edge. “We will be back if this greedy corporation continues to trespass into wild and unroaded areas,” it wrote. Much to VA’s dismay, ELF announced that the fires were only a warning, a shot across the bow. history and, as some were already speculating, perhaps a harbinger of tactics to come.Ī communiqué from ELF was faxed to a local radio station three days after the fires, claiming they had been set “on behalf of the lynx” - an endangered species in whose name a coalition of environmental groups had been suing to stop VA’s expansion into a national forest area known as Category III. Though Vail Associates, the conglomerate that runs Vail and Beaver Creek, as well as nearby Breckenridge and Keystone, promised that the mountain would be fully functioning by Christmas, the fires proved to be the costliest act of eco-sabotage in U.S. The facts were only slightly less impressive: four lifts and three buildings damaged or destroyed - the largest being the 33,000-square-foot Two Elk Lodge, which was reduced to a heap of ash and twisted metal. Some said all 31 chairlifts had been damaged, and one New York radio station reported a terrorist-fueled apocalypse - that the entire mountain was engulfed in flame. Rumors hurtled around with the speed of a careering luge. Even so, the mood in the hours immediately after the fire was charged. “Fuck Vail Associates! Long live ELF!” one of them screamed, a big grin splitting his grease-blackened face.įrankly, the levity was surprising, considering how near to disaster the town had passed if ELF’s actions had delayed the early-November opening, Vail would have experienced some truly hard times. Late in the evening, I came upon a group of merry eco-terrorists at Garfinkel’s bar, where they gleefully swung gasoline cans and highway flares, dancing to the throbbing beat. ![]() In the eerie quiet, the raucous ELFers stood out. With few restaurants and bars open in this shoulder season and most of the area’s permanent residents having decamped to the less expensive towns down-valley, the streets were empty except for the occasional cowboy or lonely ghost. A visual hodgepodge of alpine Austrian kitsch and boxy 1970s-style condominiums, Vail’s aesthetic combines - not all that successfully - the sterility of a planned community and the cheesy glitz of a Santa’s workshop display. Halloween in Vail is pretty spooky, taking place as it does after the last golfers have straggled home and before the first overwhelming wave of skiers arrives. Then I noticed that the hooded guy sipping a beer next to the ELF firebrand looked suspiciously like Ted Kaczynski - a hunch confirmed by the sign he had boldly pinned to his flannel shirt, which showed a cartoon bomb bracketed by “Uni” and “er.” He wore head-to-toe army fatigues and an “ELF” name tag on his jacket. Identifying him wasn’t all that difficult. ![]() I’d been in Vail barely 48 hours when I spied my very first eco-terrorist: a member of the Earth Liberation Front, the organization that had recently taken credit for setting the fires that did $12 million in damage on Vail Mountain in the early morning hours of October 19. ![]() history hoped to accomplish by torching Vail, their agenda likely didn’t include helping the company that owns the resort and harming those looking to protect a beloved mountain. Whatever the suspects behind the worst act of eco-terrorism in U.S.
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