Five people who were among two groups of Czech skiers died Saturday in an avalanche in western Austria, a police spokesman said.
Helmut Schutz, a spokesman for police in Tirol state, told CNN that four more suffered injuries in the midday avalanche in Wattener Lizum, which is about 15 miles (25 kilometers) southwest of Innsbruck. They were among 17 skiers, total, in the area when the avalanche struck.
No children were involved, according to the police spokesman, unlike another Alps avalanche that occurred last month.
That incident, in an off-limits area of France’s Les Deux Alpes ski resort, killed three people, including a 16-year-old girl and a 14-year-old boy. Both of the teens had been students at the St.-Exupery school in Lyon.
A schoolteacher who went with those students onto that closed slope faces charges of involuntary manslaughter, a prosecutor later announced.
A Ukrainian skier, who appeared to be alone, also died.
