Five more die in Alpine accidents

FIVE MORE skiers, including one British woman, were killed in avalanches in the French Alps yesterday, bringing to 17 the number of people killed in the region in the past four days.

The skiers were off trail when the avalanches struck at Les Arcs ski station in the Savoie region and at the nearby Val d'Isere resort, police said.

Foreign Office officials named the British victim as Catherine Ovington, 26, from Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. French police named one of the other victims as Anthony Thorburn, a 26-year-old Australian.

Miss Ovington was rushed to hospital in Grenoble after being found unconscious in a metre of snow at Val d'Isere. She died shortly after arrival.

She is the sixth Briton to have died in accidents and natural disasters in the French and Swiss Alps in recent weeks.

The other fatalities were three Frenchmen killed in an off-piste accident in Les Arcs.

Meanwhile, the body of a teenage youth, the 12th victim of Tuesday's avalanche near Chamonix, was also found.