A man was killed in the crash of a helicopter belonging to the French civil defense south of Grenoble.

The dead man was a civil defense mechanic, wrote France's Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin on Twitter on Sunday evening.

The helicopter with five people on board had an accident on the way to a mission.

There are several seriously injured, tweeted France's Minister of Health Olivier Véran.

According to the responsible prefecture, the cause of the accident was initially unknown.

The regional newspaper Le Dauphiné libéré reported, citing an eyewitness, that the helicopter caught fire after the crash on Sunday afternoon. Interior Minister Darmanin announced that he would travel to the region of the disaster on Monday.