A 26-year-old York man has died after being caught in an avalanche while snowboarding in the French Alps.

Robert Coates, 26, of Eastfield Lane, Dunnington, had been snowboarding with a friend at the French ski resort of Oisans when tragedy struck.

Mr Coates, who worked in a hotel at the Alpe d'Huez ski station near Grenoble, was off-piste at 6,235ft on Saturday when he was caught by the avalanche.

He was dug from the snow after being found by a mountain rescue team and was taken by helicopter to Nord Hospital in Grenoble, but he died from injuries received in the accident.

Appalling weather conditions were blamed as the authorities issued an alert advising against hiking and skiing off-piste.

Today Mr Coates' best friend, Nick Loftus, manager of the Mayhem snowboarding shop in Jubbergate, York, said it was the way he would have wanted to go.

"Snowboarding was his hobby and his life," he said. "He was just amazing at it. If he had been able to choose the way he went, he would have wanted to go while snowboarding.

"He was a fantastic friend, he was very popular with the ladies and was just the coolest guy, but there was no arrogance in him. He was really modest."

News of the tragedy has shocked residents in Dunnington, where Mr Coates' family live and where a neighbour said most householders had heard of the accident. It had left them stunned.

They were described as a very private family.

The other man with whom Mr Coates had been snowboarding has not yet been named, and it is not yet known where he comes from.

The accident is one of a series in the French Alps this weekend.

At least three separate avalanches have been reported, with doctors saying several victims were suffering from hypothermia.

On Sunday a British climber died after spending four days stranded on an alpine ridge suffering temperatures of minus 30 degrees C.

Jamie Fisher, 28, from Edinburgh, died after suffering from severe hypothermia.

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