SWITZERLAND:An avalanche killed six Swiss soldiers yesterday as they were climbing the Jungfrau, one of the country's best-known peaks, in a training exercise, Switzerland's defence department said.
The victims, all men, were scaling the southern flank of the mountain in the Bernese Oberland canton in central Switzerland when fresh snow gave way at 3,800 metres, said Thomas Kenner, spokesman for the Swiss mountain rescue service.
"It was an avalanche," he said. "Six soldiers were killed and their bodies have been brought down to the valley. Eight other soldiers were unharmed." In a statement, the defence department said the recruits were training as mountain specialists.
Defence and civil protection minister Samuel Schmid ordered an inquiry into the accident, telling a news briefing in the capital, Berne: "In such moments, words seem empty."
The six, who were linked by ropes in groups of three, were swept several hundred metres to their deaths.
The Swiss army regularly uses mountain territory for specialist military training.