Nine tourists were killed at an Austrian ski resort today when the cable car they were in fell to the ground after a helicopter accidentally dropped part of its load of concrete on a cable car.
Two of the dead were catapulted out of two nearby cable cars, police said.
The accident occurred in the ski resort town of Soelden, 25 miles south-west of Innsbruck and some 300 miles west of Vienna, said Edelbert Kohler, head of the criminal police in Innsbruck.
The helicopter was hauling goods to the top of the cable car lift for construction work, when a huge chunk, Mr Kohler said.
Four people were injured in the accident, while three others in the cabins escaped injury, said Jakob Falkner, an executive of the cable car company.
But Red Cross officials quoted by the Austria Press Agency spoke of seven injured - five seriously. The news agency said the piece of concrete weighed some 1,500 pounds.