Three people were killed and three others seriously injured when an avalanche in the French Alps hit a group of children on a school ski trip.



Two children, a 14-year-old and a 16-year-old, died in the incident. They were among a group of 10 experienced young skiers on a high school outing from Lyon. A Ukrainian skier who was not linked to the group was also found dead.

At least two other members of the school group were found in a state of cardiac arrest and the teacher was found with multiple injuries. They were transferred to a hospital in Grenoble.

The avalanche happened just before 4pm in Les Deux Alpes in Isère, about 30 miles (50km) from the Italian border. A large sheet of snow broke off above a black-rated run that had been closed following several days of heavy snowfall.

A spokesman from the Isère prefect’s office told France Info radio that the school group should “probably not” have been on the closed piste, but added that an investigation would have to take place into whether warning signs had been correctly in place.

There had been an avalanche warning in the surrounding area after heavy snowfall. A judicial inquiry has opened to determine the circumstances of the accident.

The young skiers were from the Lycée Saint-Exupéry in the centre of Lyon, a large high school where sports staff regularly run day trips to the ski slopes on a Wednesday.

The prefect of Isère, Jean-Paul Bonnetain, told AFP: “It appears that everyone from the school trip has been found but the searches are continuing to be sure that there were no other victims outside the school group.”

Dominique Létaing, head of the national agency for the study of snow and avalanches, told Le Monde that what stood out was the number of people hit “when we are constantly repeating that skiers must go one by one when there is an unstable layer of snow”.

He said the avalanche risk was very high – at a level 3 out of 5. “That ski-run had not been opened this season because there had been too little snow. It was not skiable.”

Daniel Stanford, 31, an electrical contractor from the UK, who was on holiday with friends, told the Guardian he missed the avalanche by minutes and was alerted to what happened “when scores of people were heading the mountain to help dig and offer help.”

He said: “The helicopter came and went up to five times while I was there, dropping supplies, stretchers and dogs to help locate victims. It was a very sombre time on the mountain and we all still can’t believe what happened.”

The radio station France Bleu said a large amount of unstable snow had fallen on the mountainside at an altitude of 2,500 metres. Local media reported hundreds of tonnes of snow slid down the mountain during the avalanche. The local paper, the Dauphine Libéré, said there had been a known avalanche risk in the area.

About 100 rescuers, including mountain teams, search dogs and helicopters with cameras designed to seek out survivors were mobilised as night fell. The search mission was said to be particularly complex.

The French president, François Hollande, gave his “sincere condolences” to the families of the victims and said the nation stood in solidarity with them. The prime minister, Manuel Valls, tweeted his “great sadness”, saying France’s thoughts were with the victims and those fighting for their lives.

The education minister is to travel to Lyon to support the school and the families.



Since the start of January, four people have been killed in avalanches in France, including two Lithuanians, a Spaniard and a Czech skier.



In September, seven people were killed by an avalanche in the Massif des Ecrins in one of the country’s worst snowslides in a decade. The avalanche struck three groups of roped climbers on an easily accessible 4,000-metre (13,000-ft) mountain popular with climbers. In January last year, six members of the French Alpine Club, aged between 50 and 70, were killed in an avalanche in the Hautes-Alpes.

The avalanche risk in the area remains at level 4 of 5.

