Marble Mountain Ski Resort chair lift damaged after lightning strike

The chair lift system at the Marble Mountain Ski Resort has been heavily damaged after apparently being hit by lightning Friday evening. 

The strike is believed to have caused a fire at the lift shack atop the mountain. 

Steady Brook resident Janice Colbourne told CBC News she witnessed the lightning strike just around supper time.

She said her husband drove to the top of the mountain on a quad a short time later after seeing smoke.

"We could see the black smoke exactly where we just saw the lightning had hit in that same area, so they got ahold of the fire department and decided to go up and check it out," she said. "They saw that the lift shack had been in flames and the flames were going into where the chairs meet up."

Colbourne said that while her husband and some members of the Steady Brook Volunteer Fire Department waited for more firefighting equipment to arrive, some propane tanks inside the shack exploded. 

"I was actually talking to my husband while that blew, it was extremely loud. And then a little while later a big crash  the cable had snapped and all the chairs from top to bottom all came down."

Colbourne says her husband told her that the lift shack has been levelled by the fire and that most of the chairs are twisted and likely unsalvageable.

She says she doesn't believe anyone was hurt.

There's no word yet on the amount of damage. Marble Mountain officials weren't available Friday night.