Man dies sledging on a safety mat

A man has been killed and two women seriously injured at Les Deux-Alpes after a late-night escapade when they hit a tree after using a safety barrier to sledge down the slopes.

Gendarmes said that they had not been drinking but it was the second tragedy to hit the Isère ski resort where three skiers were killed when they were hit by an avalanche two weeks ago.

It was also a tragedy for Le P'tit Polyte restaurant where they worked, as the news came after staff learned it had just won back a star in the Michelin Guide.

A group of five staff from restaurant had taken the protection mattress off a snow cannon and manhandled it 300m up the slope.

As they were sliding down, the ‘luge’ veered off the snow and on to ice and then into a tree where the 18-year-old commis chef was killed and the two women, a waitress and a spa worker, were seriously injured – one is in a critical condition.

Christophe Batard, the head gendarme, said they had had at most a glass or two of wine – and had had to be in good condition to manhandle the safety barrier 300metres up the slope.

The man who died was from Teyran (Hérault) and the women were from Marseille and Quintin (Côtes d'Armor).

A 54-year-old British woman skier was killed in La Plagne (Savoie) on Monday after she lost control on an icy patch on a blue intermediate piste and hit a tree. Anne Clayton, from Poynton, Cheshire, had been on a ski holiday with her grown-up sons.
Les Deux-Alpes photo:Willtron/Flickr