3 professional climbers confirmed dead in Canada

Ottawa, April 22 (IANS) The bodies of three professional climbers have been found, almost a week after they were presumed dead in an avalanche at Canada's Banff National Park.

Outdoor clothing company The North Face have identified the men as David Lama and Hansjoerg Auer from Austria, and Jess Roskelley, from the US, who were caught in the avalanche on April 17 while attempting to climb the east face of Howse Peak in Alberta, CNN reported.

The three men were members of the company's Global Athlete Team.

According to Parks Canada, the bodies were found on Sunday.

After the climbers were reported missing, park officials searched for them via air and "observed signs of multiple avalanches and debris containing climbing equipment", it said in a statement.

The east face of Howse Peak is remote and an exceptionally difficult climb, with mixed rock and ice routes requiring advanced alpine mountaineering skills, officials said.

Chelsey Dawes, a spokeswoman with Parks Canada, said it looked as though a size 3 avalanche had hit the climbers.

Roskelley, 36, from Spokane, Washington state, scaled Mount Everest at age 20. The son of a famous mountaineer, he was the youngest American to reach the summit of the world's highest peak in 2003.

Lama, 28, is also from a climbing family - his father was a mountain guide from Nepal - and he has won numerous climbing competitions as a teenager.

Auer, 35, grew up on a family farm in Austria near the Dolomite mountain range. Among his most recognised climbing achievements are the southwest-face ascent of Pakistan's Kunyang Chhish East in the Karakorum Mountains and the first ascent of the south face on Nilgiri South in Nepal.