Photo by Jónína G. Aradóttir/ Vísir

A total of ten rental cars with some unlucky tourists at the helm were caught out by a storm near Skaftafell in South East Iceland on Sunday. Though it is not clear whether they were travelling together or separately, the passengers were pelted by windswept rocks that broke the windows of their rental cars, reports Vísir.

Attempting to keep the snow from filling the car after rocks broke the windows on one side, one driver turned around but the move resulted in rocks breaking the windows on the other side as well.

All the tourists were eventually saved by Iceland’s Search and Rescue who delivered them to Hótel Skaftafell for shelter.

“I was born and raised in Öræfasveitin, so this kind of weather is nothing new,” said Jónína G. Aradóttir, a hotel employee. “But there are a lot of tourists who just wade right out into this kind of weather. We always stay in when it gets like this, but now there are a lot of people who just don’t know better. And that really sucks for them because they are going to be stuck paying for the [rental car] damages themselves.”

According to Jónína, a number of the tourists who ended up in the hotel were terribly upset by the experience, some even cried.

“We just took them in, gave them food, showed them to a room,” said Jónína. “We tried to administer some trauma counselling when we could… There really is a need for some kind of programme that helps tourists see what the weather can really be like. So this situation does not keep repeating itself over and over.”