As Mt. Sima staff prepare to open the ski hill for its regular Thursday-to-Sunday schedule, the facility's problematic double-chair lift remains closed.

"One thing you can be assured of is that we're working with maximum effort on this,” said Craig Hougen, president of the Great Northern Ski Society – the keepers of Mt. Sima.

"The issue is the same as before; the lift is running but it runs at variable speed and we don't know why.”

But until the problem is corrected, said Hougen, the chair lift will not be open to skiers, threatening to dampen another weekend of downhill skiing in Whitehorse (Mt. Sima's rope-tow and t-bar will be open this weekend).

Operations staff at Mt. Sima are currently in contact with the Californian manufacturers of the lift's control mechanism, said Hougen.

"And we will have (a repairman from California) up here in an instant if that's the thing we need to do. We're absolutely going to resolve this.”

On Dec. 4 – the earliest day Mt. Sima ever opened to skiers – the chair lift's electrical engine broke down, and more than 100 skiers stranded on the lift had to be rescued by members of the Whitehorse Fire Department.

Attempts at repairs since then have been largely unsuccessful, and promises that the lift would be operational the following weekend have been met with more shutdowns and disappointment.

As problems continue to plague Mt. Sima's chair lift, $1.5 million the Great Northern Ski Society received last July from Ottawa cannot be used to replace the almost 35-year-old lift.

Both officials from the Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency – the source of the grant windfall – and Hougen said the money must be used for the purpose the ski society originally requested it for.

"That money was allocated through the federal government for an adventure park,” said Hougen.

"It's part of the long-term business plan for Sima ... we applied for a specific project and no flexibility to direct (the funding) at a different project.

"Not only that, but for the long-term of Mt. Sima, this adventure park is going to be an enormous asset.”

Without a reliable chair lift, the "aerial adventure courses and a ZOOM Zip line” an upgraded facility promises will be inaccessible, except for those willing to hike to the top of the mountain.

But Hougen has faith in the current lift, purchased by the society in 1990 from Alyeska Resort near Anchorage, refurbished and installed at Mt. Sima and operational by 1993.

"I think there's a lot of life left in it, but the question is whether the community would like to see a larger and faster lift,” Hougen told the Star. "But that current lift itself is serviceable for a number of years.”

While the ski society paid less than $200,000 for the secondhand lift, former society president Dan Boyd estimates it cost upwards of $700,000 to purchase the equipment, transport it to Whitehorse and install Alyeska's old double chair lift at Sima.

Boyd said in an interview Tuesday that Alyeska bought the lift in 1976 from the Riblet Tramway Company – at the time the world's largest ski lift manufacturer – located in Washington State, and for the most part, that equipment now ferries skiers to the top of Mt. Sima.

"Some of the parts are very simple ... all pretty standard bulletproof type components that do need to be maintained and replaced from time to time. But very simple mechanics,” said Boyd.

"But there are other parts of the lift, controls, speed controls and the drive motor ... that are the brains of the equipment – they're complicated, very complicated.”

Alyeska had "the brains” of the equipment upgraded in the 1980s, Boyd noted, and "that technology that's there (at Mt. Sima) is now 25 years old.

"And from what I understand, the difficulties they're having right now are with the controls.”

If the current ski society is not contemplating a new chair lift, Boyd said, upgrading the control system might be a compromise.

"New and modern technology would certainly go a long way to addressing some of these difficulties,” said Boyd. "It's not going to be cheap, but I don't think it's going to be ridiculously expensive.”

Asked how much a new chair lift would set back the ski society, Hougen estimated the cost to be approximately $2 million.