A group of British tourists were recovering Tuesday after a traumatic visit to Norway's famed Briksdal Glacier. Horses pulling the carriages they were riding in from the glacier suddenly ran amok, overturning the carriages and throwing their passengers out of them.

The incident led to a dramatic rescue effort in the relatively remote mountain valley leading up to the glacier. Ambulances had to drive up dirt roads to the site of the accident and helicopters were called in to airlift the most seriously injured to local hospitals.

Doctors said Tuesday that injuries weren't as serious as first feared. A total of 16 tourists were treated, with seven admitted to hospitals in Ålesund and Førde after suffering fractures and bruising.

Most of the tourists were retirees, with some of those with broken bones in their 70s.

A British couple aged 52 and two women aged 78 and 73 were listed in fair condition at the hospital in Ålesund. Two women and a man in their 70s were under observation at the hospital in Førde, but their injuries were not listed as serious. Another eight were sent to a hospital in Nordfjordeid for treatment.

Their group of 51 had split up into 17 of the horse-drawn carriages that have carried tourists up to the Briksdal Glacier for years. The horses are all led by trained guides, but some of the normally docile animals bolted and started running off the road.

It's not the first time such accidents have occurred at Briksdal. A Japanese tourist was killed in a similar incident about five years ago.

Via Aftenposten News in English. Photo: Willy Haraldsen / SCANPIX

News [15:56]