Girl found alive under shot bodies in the French Alps

A four-year-old British girl and her older sister were found alive in a car after a mysterious shooting in the French Alps left four people dead, including the girls' parents, officials said Thursday.

'The three bodies found in the car appear to be the father, mother and grandmother,' said lieutenant-colonel Benoit Vinnemann, head of the Chambery gendarmerie which is in charge of the investigation.

'It is in any case a family, according to British people at the Saint Jorioz camping site who reported their disappearance on Wednesday night,' he added.

Besides the British family, the fourth victim of the deadly shooting was a cyclist, said to be a local man.

The little girl was found hiding under her mother's legs at around midnight some eight hours after the discovery of the three victims who were shot dead on the spot on Wednesday.

Public prosecutor Eric Maillaud said the child was only discovered when investigators gained access to the crime scene, almost eight hours after a cyclist happened upon the carnage.

Confirming that the three victims in the BMW were from a family of British holidaymakers, he said: "She was hidden under the bodies for some eight hours and didn't move for the whole time."

The young survivor was speaking English when she was found.

Her older sister was wounded in the attack and rushed by helicopter to hospital in critical condition, officials said. She is now in a more stable condition.

Officers have already established the identity of a dead man in the car, described as the father of the family.

The male victim was found at the wheel of the car, and the two dead women in the back - apparently covering the girl, four, who survived.