'I fell down the cliff-face on my backside and thought my time was up - then I had another bit of bad luck and fell into a crevasse': Brewery heir who saved British brothers in Alps helicopter crash reveals how the three cheated death

A hero skier who saved the lives of two young British brothers when their helicopter crashed during an avalanche spoke for the first time today to reveal: 'I thought my time was up'.

Brewery heir Edward Courage, 68, bravely grabbed Guy and Teddy Hutchings and threw them out of the battered chopper with him was swept down a mountainside in the Swiss Alps.

His quick thinking saved their lives but the disaster on Tuesday morning killed pilot Jerome Lovey, skier James Goff and experienced guide Adam George.

Speaking exclusively to MailOnline from the hospital bed where he's being treated for multiple broken bones, said: 'We were about to land when all hell broke loose.'

Mr Courage - who has been left with a broken left arm and wrist, shattered collarbone and seven broken ribs - said: 'It's normal for visibility to be poor when you land because the helicopter sends all the snow on the ground spraying upwards.

'But all of a sudden there was a lot of snow, and these very big chunks were hitting the windscreen, and there was this tremendous noise.

'Then there was the sensation of toppling down and I could see one of the blades slicing past the front of the helicopter at about 500mph, whether it had broken off or snapped I don't know - but I do know it shouldn't have been there.

'I realised then that the helicopter wasn't a safe place to be and our chances of survival were pretty remote so I had to get out. I'd had hold of my seat belt and had been preparing to unclick as we were about to land.

'That enabled me to get out of my seat quickly in the confusion and I think I just sort of fumbled into Guy as I leapt out and grabbed hold of Teddy and they both sort of fell out with me.'

The grandfather of three revealed how he plummeted 500 metres down the mountain before dropping another 30 metres into a half-metre-wide crevasse - but the plunge into the crevasse may have potentially saved his life as a huge mass of snow, rock and ice swept over him.

He told how he faced an agonising wait of four hours for rescue teams to reach him after he managed to summon help by using an app on his mobile phone.

Mr Courage - speaking from his hospital bed in the town of Sion at the foot of the Alps, recalled how the dramatic incident had happened on a day that began completely normally.

He said all those on board had been part of the 1936 Ski Touring Club who had lifted off at 9.30am on Tuesday and were about to land on the 3,668-metre-high Petit Combin, a mountain in the canton of Valais and close to the resort of Verbier, popular with the Royals. He had known everyone in the party except pilot Mr Lovey.

The tourists and their guide had planned to go heli-skiing, which is off-trail, downhill skiing where the skiers get to the top of the mountain by helicopter, instead of via a ski lift.

Recalling the moment the avalanche struck, Mr Courage said Guy, 23 and 18-year-old Teddy, had been sitting to his left in the rear of the helicopter with Mr Goff to his right.

Mr George had been in the front next to the pilot. He said that he was unable to reach 34-year-old Mr Goff as he tumbled out of the helicopter on Petit Combin's northern slope and said: 'I fell about 500 metres down the cliff face on my backside and I thought my time was up.

'But I then remember feeling almost slight relief as I was beginning to slow down a little until I had another bit of bad luck - and suddenly fell into a crevasse.

'I must have gone down about 30 metres deep and landed on a snow bridge - which is where some of the snow and ice had collected.

'It broke my fall, but I didn't know how secure I was because my foot had gone through the bridge. How far the drop was below, I've no idea, but had it collapsed I probably wouldn't have survived.

'That may well have saved my life as the avalanche swept down above my head.

'The crevasse was only half a metre wide and although I had transceivers on, the signal wasn't able to cut through all the ice.

'I managed to get my phone out of my pocket, and I reached my good arm up as high as I could pointing the phone towards a tiny speck of blue sky above me and activated the Echo SOS app.

'It clicked and I knew then that I'd got a satellite signal. I pressed for an ambulance and began speaking to rescue teams over the phone.

'It was extremely cold down in the crevasse, as you can imagine, and the wonderful person on the other end of the phone was trying to keep me awake, asking me questions like my wife's name, my date of birth, the ages of my children.

'The voice on the other end of the phone was telling me 'Mr Courage don't go to sleep...when you see the helicopter shout as loud as you can'

'There was at least half a dozen search and rescue helicopters. My phone signal had given them a general location and they were cross-crossing the mountain ridge.

'It took them around four hours to reach me but as soon as I saw the helicopter I shouted out 'I'm down here'. The information was relayed to the pilot and those on the ground. The helicopter passed over a second time and I did the same thing again.'

Mr Courage said rescue teams were lowered down from a helicopter and they reached the crevasse on foot.

Equipped with strong climbing gear they carefully scaled down to his position and managed to attach him to a harness to lift him to safety.

He continued: 'I'll never forget the click of that harness being clipped on to me and the man telling me 'you're safe now'. It was the best moment.

'They managed to get me to an area where one of the helicopters could hover overheard so my harness could be attached and along with one of the rescuers, I was winched 500 metres or so down.

'I was then put into a basket and winched further down the mountain to where the air ambulance was waiting to take me to hospital.'

Mr Courage - a vastly experienced skier who spends at least 160 days of the year on the slopes - was airlifted to intensive care at Hôpital du Valais, where he is due to have three operations over the weekend.

Guy and Teddy, meanwhile, had been swept 1000 metres down the mountain - equivalent to nearly the entire height of Britain's tallest peak - Ben Nevis in the Highlands but miraculously survived with relatively minor injuries.

Guy remains in the same hospital and although requires no operations he is currently 'severely beaten-up and bed-bound'.

His younger brother was released yesterday on crutches.

Tributes have been paid to those who died.

Mr George, 45, was an experienced guide from New Hampshire in the United States, who had scaled difficult cliff faces such as El Capitan and the north face of the Eiger.

Friends have set up a donation group for his widow, Caroline George-Ware, who is also a mountain guide, and their daughter Olivia.

Mr Goff, also known as Jimmy, was the son of Robert and Sheelagh Goff – the owners of the 19th-century Ballinacor Estate in Rathdrum, Co Wicklow.

His sister Sarah Davis-Goff is a well-known author and publisher.

And pilot Mr Lovey had started a job with Swiss aviation firm Air Glaciers, for which he flew the monthly heli-skiing trips, in September 2022.

Mr Courage added: 'I wasn't aware that Guy and Teddy had survived until I was in hospital. They'd carried on in the avalanche and must have gone down about 1000-metres but fortunately, they'd remained on the surface somehow.

'James Goff was a lovely boy. His father was in the second rotation waiting to go up after us.

'Adam George was one of my closest friends of the last 10 years. He was always the guide we used. He was an absolutely wonderful guy.

'I'm determined to go to his funeral on Monday. I didn't know the pilot, but my heart goes out to his family.'

Seven helicopters were sent to the site as part of the rescue effort. An investigation has been opened by the Swiss Federal Prosecutor's Office (MPC), which is responsible for aviation accidents.

A safety investigation has also been launched by the SESE (Swiss Safety Investigation Service).

According to the Swiss weather service, there was moderate wind in the high mountains earlier in the morning.

A measuring station at a height of 2735 metres on the nearby Verbier mountain logged an average wind of 15mph and gusts of up to 26mph.