Destroying glaciers
On Blatten, a small village located in the Valais canton On May 28, the glacier sank, destroying 90 percent. its buildings. A spokesman for local authorities Matthias Ebener said that the unbelievable amount of ice and rocks fell with a bang to the valley. – We lost our village, but not our heart. We will support each other and comfort each other. After a long night there will be a morning again – said mayor Blatten Matthias Bellwald at a press conference. The village was evacuated a few days ago, but one person is considered missing, he is a 64-year-old man. Solidarity with the local population was expressed by the president Switzerland Karin Keller-Sutter. The units of the Swiss army were involved in helping residents.
A huge amount of rocks and earth
Blatten was evacuated for the first time at the beginning of the month. It turned out that The part of the mountain behind the glacier crumbles, which could lead to ice masses. As the officials investigating the case stated, since then millions of cubic meters of rocks and earth have been slid. The burial of the village was documented in a film from a drone, which was widespread in social media. You can see a cloud of dust covering a significant part of the mountains just after the rocks and debris falls on Blatten, as well as pieces of shattered buildings. Significant tracts were also destroyed forestand debris blocked the nearby Lonza River, which increases the risk of flooding in the area.
Relationship with climate change?
When asked by the Reuters agency, the specialists did not clearly indicate to what extent the climate change had an impact on the sliding of the glacier. The direct cause was the crumbling slope of the mountain. However, Christian Huggel, a professor of the environment and climate at the University of Zurich, stated that while Blatten was determined by various factors, higher temperatures in the Alps have a great impact on the eternal frosting. Its loss may also negatively affect the stability of mountain rocks, so the significance of climate change cannot be excluded when the village is overwhelmed. Scientists indicate that in a hundred years all alpine glaciers may disappear if there is a global temperature increase than 1.5 degrees Cars above the state before the industrial era. Statistics show that only in 2022-2023 the glaciers lost 10 percent. your volume.
Unprecedented event in the Alps
Huggel noticed that The scale of destruction in Blatten is unprecedented for the Swiss Alps and there was no similar event in this or in the previous century. Main evacuation 300 residents were carried out on May 19, after information From geologists that this type of avalanche may occur. According to the Swiss sender of SRF, the houses were also destroyed in a village located in the Loetschental valley in southern Switzerland. This is not the first case of evacuation in this part of the Alps. Raphaël Mayzoz, head of the regional offices for natural threats, he also warned that further evacuation may be necessary in areas near Blatten.
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Sources: Reuters, New Scientist, BBC, AP