Heavy snow prompts Austria avalanche warnings
Continuing heavy snow fall in Austria’s Alpine regions raised the risk of avalanches today and prompted urgent safety warnings to hikers and skiers to avoid the areas deemed most prone to snow slides.
Strong winds and snow fall of up to 120 centimetres (47 inches) in sections of Styria, a mountainous province in southern Austria near the border with Slovenia, put the avalanche risk there at four on a five-point scale on which five is the most dangerous stage, according to the Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics in Vienna.
