Since 2011, Georgia, an Eastern Europe country that is 60% mountainous, has been trying its damnedest to increase its image as a very attractive winter sports destination.

However, now it has been forced to try even harder to restore that effort after 10 people, including nine tourists, were injured last Friday when a ski lift malfunctioned, reports Al Jazeera.

The incident happened at the Gudauri ski resort in the Caucasus mountains, near Georgia’s border with Russia:

Giorgi Chogovadze, head of Georgia’s tourism administration, said that in addition to paying for all expenses, the government invited those injured and their families to return to Georgia.

“It made us very happy that all of them are interested and expressed their wish to visit us again. In the next winter season, those injured and their companions will be invited, and all of their expenses will be covered by the Georgian Mountain Resorts Development Company,” he said.

“The country’s image has somewhat suffered from this fact, of course. The tourism administration and other government bodies will increase efforts tenfold to improve the image, including by inviting journalists as well as [launching] advertisement campaigns.”

You see, the real potential damage to the country’s image stemmed from a range of video footage that quickly went viral because what it features is crazy as hell.

And it’s all encompassed in the video below:

I told you it was intense!

Of course, one ski lift malfunction isn’t going to ruin Georgia’s reputation as a safe place to visit:

Rustam Ibragimov, a Russian tourist who jumped from the faulty ski lift to save himself, wrote an extensive note on Facebook, defending the resort’s administration from those accusing them of negligence.

“The ski resort administration reacted promptly on accident and they worked at 200 percent. Now there is a lot of misinformation going on, and my request would be not to spread it. No need to panic. The Georgian government provides assistance to the injured,” he said.

“The brake system did not work and why, we do not know now … We should wait for the results of the investigation.”

Now that’s something you don’t see every day.

[source: aljazeera]