Italy avalanche: 18th body pulled from rubble of hotel

Rescuers have located an 18th body in the rubble of an Italian hotel crushed by an avalanche as they mourned colleagues killed in a nearby helicopter crash.

Italian Mountain Rescue Service continues excavation work at the site of the avalanche-buried Hotel Rigopiano. Picture: AP

The emergency helicopter slammed into a mountainside in the Campo Felice area on Tuesday as its crew was rescuing an injured skier, killing the two pilots, three crew and the skier.

Some of the crew had been working at the Hotel Rigopiano avalanche site in the central Abruzzo region about 60 miles away, up until Monday.

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Eleven people remain under the hotel rubble .

Premier Paolo Gentiloni is to brief parliament on Wednesday on the series of earthquakes, heavy snowfall and the avalanche that have pummelled central Italy in recent days and weeks, and the round-the-clock response by civil protection, firefighter and emergency crews.