Austria avalanche kills family of four

VIENNA, Austria -- A German family of four has been crushed to death in an avalanche that buried their car while they were travelling in Austria.

The family was driving through a mountain pass near the Tyrolean high-altitude resort of Obergurgl in Austria when the massive snow slide struck.

A police spokesman in the Tyrol capital Innsbruck said the avalanche wrecked the car carrying the parents, their son and daughter.

The 200-metre wide snow sheet also buried two other cars, but the three occupants survived the ordeal unhurt.

In a separate avalanche near Obergurgl on Friday, rescuers pulled out two people from the snow unscathed.

Alert after heavy snow

Obergurgl is a popular ski resort 30 miles south-west of Innsbruck in the Oetz Valley.

Parts of western Austria were put on heightened avalanche alert earlier on Friday after heavy snow.

The deadly avalanche happened two years to the day after 38 people were killed in two separate snow slides in the Tyrolean resorts of Galtuer and Valzur in Austria's worst natural disaster in 40 years.

Sheet ice and snow fall caused 15 trucks and 40 cars to skid and crash into one another on a stretch of the A2 highway in south-eastern Austria, killing one person and injuring at least another 10, motoring group ARBOe said in a statement. Sections of the A1 highway linking Austria to Germany via Salzburg were completely shut during the afternoon, and on the A10 highway from Salzburg to Italy a six-mile-long traffic jam had built up in front of the Tauerntunnel beneath the Alps.

Thousands of tourists were trapped in the popular ski resorts of Ischgl and Galtuer in Tyrol and Lech and Zuers in Vorarlberg after snow buried road and rail links and raised the threat of avalanches.

In February 1999, about 20,000 tourists were stranded in the same four resorts. The same month, two avalanches ripped into the heart of Galtuer and next-door Valzur, killing 38 people.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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