AN East Lancashire ski instructor, stranded for a week in the Austrian snowstorms which claimed 30 lives, has praised the way he and other tourists were treated.

Dave Smith, 57, a part-time instructor at Ski Rossendale, was cut off in the Austrian village of Ischgl after eight days of continuous heavy snow which caused a series of deadly avalanches in the area.

A week's trip to the ski resort turned into an enforced fortnight's stay after snow blocked the routes back to ZM- rich Airport.

Finally Mr Smith, his wife Pamela and his sister and brother-in-law Maureen and Jack Graham, of Surrey, were helicoptered out a week after they were originally due to leave.

Geoffrey Jones, another part-time instructor at Ski Rossendale, was also back home safely after being trapped in GaltM- r.

"The first four days of the holiday there were beautiful. Blue skies and ideal ski-ing weather," said Mr Smith, of Worsley, near Manchester. "Then it began to snow and it kept going continuously, more or less, for eight days. "By the Thursday we realised there was no way we were going to get back to ZM- rich to catch the plane home. There was no way through at all.

"The local council put up huge snow roadblocks at each end of the village and the police manned them to stop people from trying to get through for their own safety.

"I saw one avalanche at the far side of the village, about a quarter of a mile away. I heard a loud crack in the middle of the night and saw it come down the hill but it didn't hit any of the houses or the road. A cloud of powdered snow went up in the air and that was it really.

"There were fears that a large avalanche might come down on part of the village and tourists were evacuated from there but the locals wanted to stay and in the end it didn't happen."

Mr Smith, who has visited the area over the last ten years, ski-ing in winter and climbing in summer, praised local people and the emergency services.

"There's been a lot of bad publicity," he said. "I heard reports it wasn't well organised but as far as I was concerned it was all done in a very orderly way and very well managed. The local people couldn't do enough to help.

"I've got nothing but compliments for the people who helped us in every way."

Mr Smith said his experience would not put him off returning to Austria.

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