Six people were killed in an avalanche near the ski resort of Soelden in the Austrian Alps, media said on today quoting police and rescue services in the isolated high-altitude region.

There is a story told by NHS nurses about a man who turned up at accident and emergency walking in a strange manner and telling a confused tale.

Where to go, how to save, what to avoid

Recalling the icy landscapes of Fargo and Affliction, Peter Anthony's debut delivers all the pay offs of a cinematic chiller. Set in Immaculate, a small Minnesota farming community, the township is knee-deep in roadside shrines and creepy garden-front Madonnas – reminders of its immigrant past. It's Christmas Eve, and the town is hunkering down in readiness for a serious blizzard.

Massive slide of ice and rocks engulfs nine walkers on Highlands expedition

Climbers were warned of a high avalanche risk today after three people were killed on a mountain.

'It was massive... a huge slab of snow which just came away. We were engulfed,' says eyewitness

Saracens 37 Bristol 13

British climbing hero and friend killed by fall of debris as they abseil near Chamonix in France

The 2008-9 ski season has been properly under way for a month, and it appears that projections of economic doom are thankfully not coming true. The world's largest ski-resort operator, the French Compagnie des Alps, has reported that sales were actually up 2.4 per cent over the crucial Christmas/New Year period.

Eight snowmobilers buried in avalanches were missing Monday in western Canada's backcountry, and rescuers searching for the men faced "extreme" risk themselves from crashing snow.

Xavier De Le Rue, 29

A mountaineering adventure more tense, more edge-of-the-seat suspenseful, than Touching the Void? Almost incredibly, this German drama, based on a true story, is that film.

Sacked as coach of Wales last year after World Cup defeat to Fiji, Gareth Jenkins is now back at his beloved Scarlets after taking a much needed break from the game to analyse where it went wrong