Paris: An avalanche in the French Alps hit a group of schoolchildren and the person accompanying them on Wednesday, killing at least three people and gravely injuring three others, police said.
The school group were skiing on the Bellecombe piste at the Deux Alpes ski resort, about 50 kilometres from the Italian border, when the avalanche hit.
The snow slide killed a 14-year-old, a 16-year-old and a Ukrainian adult skier who was not with the school group, according to police and an official from the resort.
Three of the victims were found in a state of cardiopulmonary arrest, police said. The teacher was found unconscious, according to one report.
The president's office said three people were seriously injured.
Apart from the two teenagers that died, all other students from the group of 19 had been accounted for and were safe, the ministry said. Rescue teams worked into the evening searching for other skiers who might have been buried in the snow.
The avalanche occurred after a large sheet of snow broke off on a black-rated slope - for expert skiers only - that had been closed after several days of heavy snowfall.
It was unclear why members of the school group and an adult with them had been skiing on a black-rated slope that had already been closed because of the risk of an avalanche.