Eight found alive in Italy avalanche hotel
Eight people have been found alive in Italy's Rigopiano hotel, two days after it was buried in an avalanche.
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Rescuers said the survivors had been discovered buried under snow. Two are children, Italian media said.
Video footage of the first survivors being pulled free was released by rescue teams on Friday afternoon - more than 40 hours after the avalanche.
The deep avalanche buried the remote hotel, in the central Abruzzo region, after several earthquakes.
At least four people have been confirmed dead, and about 20 are still missing, as the rescue effort continues in difficult conditions.
Teams have been working at the scene for more than 24 hours in temperatures well below zero.
A female relative told the BBC that her young cousins were those found alive by rescuers.
Her uncle - who was already being treated at the local hospital - was taken to see them, she said.
"My aunt is from Romania, she is 43 years old - her daughter just turned six years old, and the boy is eight," the woman, who asked not to be identified, said.
"They were on holiday and just getting ready to leave when the avalanche came."
She said they had still not had news about her aunt. "We are very worried," she added.
The survivors reportedly took refuge beneath a collapsed portion of ceiling, where they were able to light a fire to keep warm.
Italian media outlets said the group was made up of three men, three women, and two children.
The BBC's James Reynolds, in the nearby town of Penne, said news of the rescue had led to an outpouring of emotion.
"In one village, a young woman - who's worked at the collapsed hotel - dropped to her knees and burst into tears when she heard the news," he said.
Wednesday's earthquakes included four stronger than magnitude 5, in a region already struggling with heavy snowfall which buried phone lines and took out power cables. Phone lines were down at the Rigopiano hotel early on Wednesday.
Some reports suggest the guests had gathered on the ground floor of the hotel to await evacuation following the earthquakes.
But the avalanche completely buried the hotel at about 17:00 on Wednesday.
The force of the snow partially brought down the roof and, according to some reports, shifted the building 10m (11 yards) off its foundations.
Rescuers, who were forced to ski and shovel their way towards the site of the avalanche, were reportedly only dispatched hours later.
One survivor, who had left the hotel for his car, telephoned his boss, a man named Quintino Marcella, just after 17:30.
Mr Marcella said he immediately contacted the authorities, but they did not initially believe him. He said he kept calling for two hours before being told help was on the way.
The first rescue team reached the hotel by 04:30 (03:30 GMT) on Thursday, after a night of freezing temperatures.
Twenty-two guests and seven staff members were registered as being at the hotel, but the actual number is unclear, and rescuers say it could be as many as 35.
Two people who were outside the hotel at the time of the avalanche survived.
A list of 23 names given by La Stampa newspaper suggests that most are Italians but they include a Swiss national and a Romanian.
Three are children aged six, seven and nine, and the oldest person on the list is a man of 60.
Italy has seen a wave of damaging earthquakes in recent months. The Apennines region saw three magnitude-6 tremors between August and October.
It is believed that the geological stress is spread across a number of fault lines in Italy's mountain ranges - with recent earthquakes as the result.