Five skiers killed in French Alps avalanches
Five skiers were killed in two separate avalanches in the French Alps on Wednesday, local officials have confirmed.
One torrent of snow came in Val-Cenis, in the south-eastern Savoie region, killing four Norwegian skiers, while a Swiss skier died further north in the Haute-Savoie region, near Chamonix.
Three of the Norwegians were killed instantly while a fourth, a woman, died in a nearby hospital after suffering severe hypothermia and a cardiorespiratory arrest.
They were part of a larger group of seven skiers and the remaining three were unharmed.
Jacques Arnoux, mayor of Val-Cenis, told AFP each member of the group had been carrying an avalanche beacon as they were off-piste skiing.
Also known as backcountry skiing, it refers to any area not marked or maintained for use by skiers and is considerably more dangerous.
"It was an avalanche of great size which was triggered outside the ski area," Mayor Arnoux added.
A team of 10 mountain rescue specialists were despatched in the operation, a police source said.
The Swiss victim, a 30-year-old woman, was skiing with her brother, who was taken to hospital for tests, and her father, who was unharmed.
All three had anti-avalanche airbags and were skiing off-piste in the Mont Blanc massif mountain range.
On Tuesday, a 55-year-old Brazilian-Portuguese skier was killed in a "very large" avalanche on an off-piste section Mont Blanc.
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