At Least 30 Feared Missing in Italian Avalanche

A hotel in central Italy has been buried by a snow slide, leaving as many as 30 people missing.

"Around 30 people are unaccounted for, between guests and workers at the Hotel Rigopiano in Farindola," 

the head of Italy's civil protection department, Fabrizio Curcio, told reporters.

The chief of the civil protection department, Fabrizio Curcio, told RAI News that rescuers reached the Hotel Rigopiano but that the situation was difficult, with authorities "planning how to intervene."

The avalanche occurred after a series of four earthquakes in the region on Wednesday. Farindola, Italy is a little more than 100 miles from Rome, and temblors associated with the avalanche prompted school and transportation closures in Italy's capital city, the New York Times reported.

The Times noted that "news channels in Italy showed images of the roof collapsed on the main hall of the hotel… although it was not clear if the structural damage had been caused by the earthquakes or by the avalanche."

"I am alive because I went to get something from my car," one of two survivors as of Thursday, Giampiero Parete, told medical staff, according to la Repubblica newspaper.

Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni, who has only been on the job since December following the resignation of Matteo Renzi, said the region impacted by the snow hasn't seen winter weather such as this in decades.

A deadly earthquake struck central italy in August, killing 299. The Telegraph newspaper noted this week's quakes affected already "badly-damaged towns and villages" in Abruzzo, Lazio and Marche, areas struck by the August quake. Central Italy was shaken again by more quakes in October.