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BBC News
02-08-2025
- Climate
- BBC News
Why glaciers are threatening to wipe out more mountain villages
In a small village in Switzerland's beautiful Loetschental valley, Matthias Bellwald walks down the main street and is greeted every few steps by locals who smile or offer a handshake or friendly Bellwald is a mayor, but this isn't his village. Two months ago his home, three miles away in Blatten, was wiped off the map when part of the mountain and glacier collapsed into the village's 300 residents had been evacuated days earlier, after geologists warned that the mountain was increasingly unstable. But they lost their homes, their church, their hotels and their Kalbermatten also lost the hotel that had been in his family for three generations."The feeling of the village, all the small alleys through the houses, the church, the memories you had when you played there as a child… all this is gone." Today, he is living in borrowed accommodation in the village of Wiler. Mr Bellwald has a temporary office there too, where he is supervising the massive clean-up operation - and the good news is, he believes the site can be cleared by 2028, with the first new houses ready by 2029. But it comes with a hefty Blatten is estimated to cost hundreds of millions of dollars, perhaps as much as $1 million (USD) per contributions from the public quickly raised millions of Swiss francs to help those who had lost their homes. The federal government and the canton promised financial support too. But some in Switzerland are asking: is it worth it? Though the disaster shocked Switzerland, some two thirds of the country is mountainous, and climate scientists warn that the glaciers and the permafrost – the glue that holds the mountains together – are thawing as the global temperature increases, making landslides more likely. Protecting areas will be spends almost $500m a year on protective structures, but a report carried out in 2007 for the Swiss parliament suggested real protection against natural hazards could cost six times that a worthwhile investment? Or should the country - and residents - really consider the painful option of abandoning some of their villages? The day the earth shook The Alps are an integral part of Swiss identity. Each valley, like the Loetschental, has its own culture. Mr Kalbermatten used to take pride in showing hotel guests the ancient wooden houses in Blatten. Sometimes he taught them a few words of Leetschär, the local Blatten, and the prospect of losing others like it, has made many Swiss ask themselves how many of those alpine traditions could disappear. Today, Blatten lies under millions of cubic metres of rock, mud, and ice. Above it, the mountain remains they were first evacuated, Blatten's residents, knowing their houses had stood there for centuries, believed it was a purely precautionary measure. They would be home again soon, they Lehner, a retired businessman, says no one expected the scale of the disaster. "We knew there would be a landslide that day… But it was just unbelievable. I would never have imagined that it would come down so quickly. "And that explosion, when the glacier and landslide came down into the valley, I'll never forget it. The earth shook." Landslides are 'more unpredictable' The people of Blatten, keen to get their homes back as soon as possible, don't want to talk about climate change. They point out that the Alps are always dangerous, and describe the disaster as a once in a millennium climate scientists say global warming is making alpine life more Huss, a glaciologist with Zurich's Federal Institute of Technology, as well as glacier monitoring group Glamos, argues that climate change was a factor in the Blatten disaster."The thawing of permafrost at very high elevation led to the collapse of the summit," he explains. "This mountain summit crashed down onto the glacier… and also the glacier retreat led to the fact that the glacier stabilised the mountain less efficiently than before. So climate change was involved at every angle."Geological changes unrelated to climate change also played a role, he concedes - but he points out that glaciers and permafrost are key stabilising factors across the team at Glamos has monitored a record shrinkage of the glaciers over the past few years. And average alpine temperatures are increasing. In the days before the mountain crashed down, Switzerland's zero-degree threshold – the altitude at which the temperature reaches freezing point – rose above 5,000 metres, higher than any mountain in the country."It is not the very first time that we're seeing big landslides in the Alps," says Mr Huss. "I think what should be worrying us is that these events are becoming more frequent, but also more unpredictable." A study from November 2024 by the Swiss Federal Research Institute, which reviewed three decades of literature, concurred that climate change was "rapidly altering high mountain environments, including changing the frequency, dynamic behavior, location, and magnitude of alpine mass movements", although quantifying the exact impact of climate change was "difficult". More villages, more evacuations Graubünden is the largest holiday region in Switzerland, and is popular with skiers and hikers for its untouched nature, alpine views and pretty villages. The Winter Olympics was hosted here twice - in the upmarket resort of St Moritz - while the town of Davos hosts world leaders for the World Economic Forum each village in Graubünden has a different story to was evacuated more than two years ago because of signs of dangerous instability in the mountain above. Its residents have still not been able to return, and in July heavy rain across Switzerland led geologists to warn a landslide appeared imminent. Elsewhere in Switzerland, above the resort of Kandersteg, in the Bernese Oberland region, a rockface has become unstable, threatening the village. Now residents have an evacuation too, heavy rain this summer raised the alarm, and some hiking trails up to Oeschinen Lake, a popular tourist attraction, were disasters have claimed lives. In 2017, a massive rockslide came down close to the village of Bondo, killing eight has since been rebuilt, and refortified, at a cost of $64 million. As far back as 2003, the village of Pontresina spent millions on a protective dam to shore up the thawing permafrost in the mountain every alpine village is at risk, but the apparent unpredictability is causing huge concern. The debate around relocation Blatten, like all Swiss mountain villages, was risk mapped and monitored; that's why its 300 residents were evacuated. Now, questions are being asked about the future of other villages the aftermath of the disaster, there was a huge outpouring of sympathy. But the possible price tag of rebuilding it also came with editorial in the influential Neue Zürcher Zeitung questioned Switzerland's traditional - and constitutional - wealth distribution model, which takes tax revenue from urban centres like Zurich to support remote mountain article described Swiss politicians as being "caught in an empathy trap", adding that "because such incidents are becoming more frequent due to climate change, they are shaking people's willingness to pay for the myth of the Alps, which shapes the nation's identity."It suggested people living in risky areas of the Alps should consider relocation. Preserving the alpine villages is expensive. And Neue Zürcher Zeitung was not the first to question the cost of saving every alpine community, but its tone angered three quarters of Swiss live in urban areas, many have strong family connections to the mountains. Switzerland may be a wealthy, highly developed, high-tech country now, but its history is rural, marked by poverty and harsh living conditions. Famine in the 19th century caused waves of Kalbermatten explains that the word "heimat" is hugely important in Switzerland. "Heimat is when you close your eyes and you think about what you did as a child, the place you lived as a child."It's a much bigger word than home."Ask a Swiss person living for decades in Zurich or Geneva, or even New York, where their heimat is, and for many, the answer will be the village they were born Mr Kalbermatten and his sister and brothers, who live in cities, heimat is the valley where people speak Leetschär, the dialect they all still dream in. The fear is that if these valleys become depopulated, other aspects of unique mountain culture could be lost too - like the Tschäggättä, traditional wooden masks, unique to the Loetschental valley. Their origins are mysterious, possibly pagan. Every February, local young men wear them, along with animal skins, and run through the Kalbermatten points to the example of some areas of northern Italy where this loss of culture has happened. "[Now] there are only abandoned villages, empty houses, and wolves."Do we want that?" For many, the answer is no: An opinion poll from research institute, Sotomo, asked 2,790 people what they most cherished about their country. The most common answer? Our beautiful alpine landscape, and our stability. But the poll did not ask what price they were prepared to pay. Trying to tame a mountain Boris Previsic, the director of the University of Lucerne's Institute for the Culture of the Alps, says that many Swiss, at least in the cities, had begun to believe they had tamed the alpine railways, tunnels, cable cars and high alpine passes are masterpieces of engineering, connecting alpine communities. But now, in part because of climate change, he suggests, that confidence is gone."The human induced geology is too strong compared to human beings," he argues. "In Switzerland, we thought we could do everything with infrastructure. Now I think we are at ground zero concerning infrastructure." The village of Blatten had stood for centuries. "When you are in a village which has existed already for 800 years, you should feel safe. That is what is so shocking."In his view, it is time to fight against these villages dying out. "To fight means we have to be more prepared," he explains. "But we have to be more flexible. We have always also to consider evacuation."At the end of the day, he adds, "you cannot hold back the whole mountain".In the village of Wiler, Mr Previsic's point is greeted with a weary smile. "The mountain always decides," agrees Mr Bellwald."We know that they are dangerous. We love the mountains, we don't hate them because of that. Our grandfathers lived with them. Our fathers lived with them. And our children will also live with them." At lunchtime in the local restaurant in Wiler, the tables are filled with clean-up teams, engineers and helicopter crew. The Blatten recovery operation is in full one table, a man from one of Switzerland's biggest insurance companies sits alone. Every half hour, he is joined by someone, an elderly couple, a middle aged man, a young woman. He buys each a drink, and carefully notes down the details of their lost along the valley's winding roads, lorries and bulldozers trundle up to the disaster site. Overhead, helicopters carry large chunks of debris. Even the military is Neuhaus commands the Swiss army's disaster relief readiness battalion, and says they must press on despite the scale of the task. "We have to," he says. "There are 300 life histories buried down there."The abiding feeling is one of stubborn determination to carry on. "If we see someone from Blatten, we hug each other," says Mr Kalbermatten."Sometimes we say, 'it's nice, you're still here.' And that's the most important thing, we are all still here."Lead image: The village of Blatten after the disaster. Credit: EPA / Shutterstock BBC InDepth is the home on the website and app for the best analysis, with fresh perspectives that challenge assumptions and deep reporting on the biggest issues of the day. And we showcase thought-provoking content from across BBC Sounds and iPlayer too. You can send us your feedback on the InDepth section by clicking on the button below.
The Independent
01-07-2025
- Climate
- The Independent
Villagers nervously watch a mountain peak after rockslide buried their neighbours
In the Swiss Alpine resort of Kandersteg, officials have been closely monitoring a deteriorating mountain peak that towers above its picturesque homes and hotels, after a glacier collapse and massive rockslide buried a neighbouring village weeks ago. The destruction late in May of Blatten, a village of around 300 people in the Loetschental valley, threw into sharp relief concern about the impact of melting permafrost as temperatures trend higher on Alpine mountain ranges. Blatten was evacuated before a chunk of a glacier broke off, triggering a dangerous cascade of ice, earth and rock towards the village, in a manner similar to what Kandersteg has been preparing for. "Of course, Blatten really upset us," said Kandersteg's mayor Rene Maeder. "It really gets under your skin. You're speechless when you see those images of the violence of nature." Still, Maeder was confident Kandersteg's dams and daily monitoring prepared it well to avert disaster, with researchers checking the mountain via GPS, radar and drone. There has been a heightened threat of rockslides in Kandersteg since 2018, when paragliders noted that Spitzer Stein, a distinctive rocky peak crowning a lush Alpine landscape, was losing height and that bits had broken off it. That discovery made the village a testing ground for technology that monitors what some experts believe is the likely impact of climate change on the Alps, where thawing permafrost has weakened rock structures that were long frozen solid. Seismic activity and geological instability are also risks for the region's mountains. Kandersteg was a prime example of an area with historical structural instability that could be aggravated by many factors, including permafrost, said Robert Kenner at the Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research in Davos. "What calmed down for about 3,000 years is now reactivated," he said. Sensors monitoring GPS locations on the Spitzer Stein showed the mountain shifting by up to 70 centimetres (2.3 feet) a day, Maeder said. In the event of major rock movement, residents should receive warnings at least 48 hours in advance. Blatten was evacuated 10 days before the deluge, which caused insurance losses of 320 million Swiss francs ($400 million), an initial estimate by the Swiss insurance association showed. There are about 48 Swiss Alpine peaks of at least 4,000 meters (13,123 feet) in height, and several hundred at least 3,000 meters high. In 2017, a landslide killed eight hikers in the southern village of Bondo, despite prior evacuations. Monitoring there has since been ramped up. Kandersteg, with a population of about 1,400, has spent over 11 million Swiss francs ($13.81 million) on disaster preparedness, including dams to slow flooding, Mayor Maeder said. Residents, who get regular updates on the mountain's movements via email and WhatsApp, have faith in the technology. "We still sleep well," said Patrick Jost, head of Kandersteg's tourism office, whose home is one of the most exposed to a potential Spitzer Stein collapse. He lives with his two children in the red zone, the village's most high-risk area, where no new construction is allowed. A map of Kandersteg: Despite the shock of Blatten, life is largely unchanged, including vital tourism, locals say. Kandersteg will perform its first ever full evacuation drill next year, Maeder said, observing: "Blatten and Kandersteg, that's just the tip of the iceberg." Residents like 77-year-old Rudi Schorer know they will have to move fast in an emergency, and have set aside identification details, spare clothes and a few belongings. "These are ready in a suitcase at home," Schorer said. "That's what we were advised to do, and that's what we did."
Times
29-05-2025
- Climate
- Times
Swiss glacier collapse: Person missing in landslide burying Blatten
One person is missing and 90 per cent of a village has been destroyed after a chunk of a glacier came crashing into a Swiss valley. Dramatic drone video taken by the Swiss national broadcaster SRF showed an avalanche of ice, mud and rock completely covering part of the southwestern village of Blatten, the river running through it and the wooded sides of the surrounding Loetschental valley. Officials said one person was missing, despite the village's 300 residents and livestock having been evacuated some days ago. Emergency services had urged people to stay away from the area that they warned was hazardous. 'The unimaginable has happened,' Matthias Bellwald, the mayor of Blatten, told a press conference after the slide. Appearing to fight back tears, he said: 'We've lost our village. The village is under rubble. We will rebuild.' Stephane Ganzer, an official in the canton of Valais where Blatten is located, told Swiss media that the slide 'at first glance covered 90 per cent of the village'. 'There's a risk that the situation could get worse,' Ganzer told Canal9, citing a nearby river that may be blocked. The landslide was caused by a large section of the Birch glacier that measured about 1.5 million cubic meters, located above the village, which had broken off. Officials said millions of cubic metres of rock and soil had already fallen down since Blatten was first evacuated on March 19, when part of the mountain behind the glacier began to crumble. Map of glacier collapse in Blatten The president, Karin Keller-Sutter, said in a social media post: 'It's terrible to lose your home. In these hours, I feel for the residents of Blatten.' The extent of the damage to Blatten had no precedent in the Swiss Alps in the current or previous century, according to Christian Huggel, a professor of environment and climate at the University of Zurich. Huggel told Reuters it was widely known that local permafrost had been affected by changing temperatures in the Alps, which had warmed over the years due to climate change. In 2017, eight hikers were killed and many homes destroyed when the biggest landslide in more than a hundred years came crashing down close to the southeastern village of Bondo.
Sky News
28-05-2025
- Climate
- Sky News
One person missing after mudslide buries Swiss mountain village
One person is missing after a deluge of rock, mud and ice buried 90% of a Swiss mountain village, officials have said. It came after a glacier overlooking the settlement of Blatten, in southern Switzerland, partially collapsed on Wednesday, sending the debris raining down. "An unbelievable amount of material thundered down into the valley," Matthias Ebener, a spokesman for local authorities in the Valais canton. He also confirmed one person was missing. Approximately 300 residents, as well as livestock, were evacuated from the area on 19 May after geologists warned that a 1.5 million cubic meter (52 million cubic feet) glacier overlooking the village was at risk of imminent collapse. Local councillor Stephane Ganzer told Swiss media that the mud and rockslide "at first glance covered 90% of the village". Footage shared on social media showed the moment the debris came down, leaving behind destroyed buildings and other infrastructure in the village, which is nestled in the Loetschental valley. Emergency services warned people that the area was hazardous and urged them to stay away. Swiss President Karin Keller-Sutter expressed her solidarity with villagers.
CNN
28-05-2025
- Climate
- CNN
Mud and rock buries evacuated Swiss village after glacier collapse, one person missing
A huge chunk of a glacier in the Swiss Alps broke off on Wednesday afternoon, causing a deluge of ice, mud and rock to bury part of a mountain village evacuated earlier this month due to the risk of a rockslide, authorities said. One person is currently missing, officials said. Drone footage broadcast by Swiss national broadcaster SRF showed a vast plain of mud and soil completely covering part of the village of Blatten, the river running through it and the wooded sides of the surrounding valley. 'An unbelievable amount of material thundered down into the valley,' said Matthias Ebener, a spokesperson for local authorities in the southwestern canton of Valais. One person was missing, Ebener said. The rubble of shattered wooden buildings could be seen on the flanks of the huge mass of earth in the drone footage. Buildings and infrastructure in Blatten, whose roughly 300 inhabitants were evacuated on May 19 after geologists had identified the risk of an imminent avalanche of rock and ice from above, were hit hard by the rockslide, Ebener said. SRF said houses were destroyed in the village nestled in the Loetschental valley in southern Switzerland. Swiss President Karin Keller-Sutter expressed her solidarity with the local population as emergency services warned people the area was hazardous and urged them to stay away, closing off the main road into the valley. 'It's terrible to lose your home,' Keller-Sutter said on X. Authorities have been monitoring the slopes above Blatten since ordering residents to leave their homes. A video shared widely on social media showed the dramatic moment when the glacier partially collapsed, creating a huge cloud that covered part of the mountain as rock and debris came rumbling down into the outskirts of the village.
