The ANWB emergency help centre has registered a 20% increase in skiing accidents compared to the same period last year, the organisation has said.

“We thought things might get busier because the number of bookings had gone up but we didn’t think it would be this busy,” director Victor Geskes told broadcaster NOS.

Inexperience is a problem, he said, and more people are bumping into each other on crowded and icy slopes. Accidents due to dangerous snow conditions are also leading to more injuries, he said.

Most of the people who are reporting an injury had been holidaying in Austria, followed by France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.

In previous years, the most common injuries were broken bones and knee injuries but this year the centre clocked up more broken arms. Why this should be the case is unclear, the ANWB said.

Geskes said that many of the injured did not have insurance, or had continuous travel insurance but forgot to tick the winter sports box. That can be a costly oversight, Geskes said. “A helicopter trip from the piste to the hospital will set you back between €4,000 and €6,000.”

Over 100 people have died this year because they were skiing off piste in treacherous snow conditions, leading to avalanches. In Verbier in Switzerland, a 22-year-old Dutch national died in an avalanche earlier this week and last week a 71-year-old man also died in an avalanche in Austria. Both had been skiing off piste.