Search teams plan to fly over the scene of an avalanche in the French Alps, trying to find any trace of eight climbers swept French minister: No chance of survivors from avalanche ...
Five to face Concorde crash trial ... away on Sunday.
Officials say there is no chance of finding any survivors, and that the victims' bodies may never be recovered.
The eight were among a party of climbers hit by a wall of snow 200m (600ft) long and 50m wide, that struck as they climbed the Mont Blanc range.
Survivors told how they were "mown down" by the wall of snow.
"There was absolutely no noise, it was very disturbing. We only had time to swerve to the right before being mown down," said Frenchman Nicolas Duquesne, one of eight people who survived the disaster.
He said he had to "swim" through the snow to keep his head above the surface.
Lethal year
The accident happened at about 0300 (0100 GMT) on Sunday morning on the Mont-Blanc du Tacul mountain, part of the range that includes Mont Blanc, Europe's highest peak.
The climbers set off during the night, in order to take advantage of firmer snow caused by overnight freezing.
But a large block of glacier ice - a "serac" - broke off higher up the mountain, triggering a huge cascade of snow that swept the party away.
Eight survived but eight others - five Austrians and three Swiss - were apparently buried beneath tons of snow.
Some 40 searchers, with specially trained dogs, and three helicopters failed to find any trace of the missing adventurers on Sunday, and the search was called off in the evening.
Rescue officials said an aerial survey would be carried out on Monday, but it was too risky to carry out a ground search.
"We no longer have any hope of finding people alive," a spokesman for the regional police told the AFP news agency.
He said the avalanche area remained "extremely dangerous, because it is surrounded by seracs".
"There is no question of putting our search teams' lives in danger," he added.
The bodies might be revealed as snow continued to melt through the summer, he said, in which case they would be recovered.
However some avalanche victims end up in crevasses, and are never found.
The avalanche was the deadliest to hit climbers in the Alps this year.
The BBC's Hugh Schofield in Paris says it has been a lethal summer, with about 100 climbers killed since 1 June in France, Italy, Austria and Switzerland. About 20 of them have died on Mont Blanc.
(BBC)
<< Back