Because the alternative is a 3 hour climb down into the valley and up another mountain to get to school.

But yes, this was a death trap from the beginning. Hopefully they learned some lessons from this and get actually qualified people to build a new one.

When the alternative route is several hours drive vs 5 minutes cable car ride, it's obvious that people would choose the shorter ride. Besides, it's not like that particular cable car has failed before, so the passengers probably don't think much about the risk.