Residents of the Swiss village of Brienz/Brinzauls were recently removed by Swiss authorities, who deemed the village unsafe due to the movement of a rock mass on a plateau above the town. Brienz/Brinzauls, located in the heart of the Swiss Alps and roughly 25 miles south of the ski resort Davos, is home to approximately 100 villagers and is mainly home to farmers. It is a centuries-old village that sits at about 1,150 meters (3,773 feet) of altitude. Swiss officials believe there is an imminent risk of a collapse that could potentially destroy the village.
Brienz/Brinzauls is no stranger to these types of evacuations. In June of 2023, the village was evacuated before it experienced a collapse in which millions of cubic meters of rock fell and narrowly missed the village without causing extensive damage, according to an article by PlanetSki.
Less than a month ago on May 28, 2o25, the Swiss village of Blatten was almost completely destroyed after a glacier carrying rock and other debris detached and slide down a mountainside. It was estimated that roughly 320 million Swiss francs (roughly $393 million) of damage was caused in the disaster. Luckily, scientists had predicted this event and all 300 villagers were able to safely evacuate. However, this event showed the damage that a landslide can cause to villages that are at risk.
“Nature is stronger than human beings and mountain people know this well,” Swiss Environment Minister Albert Rösti said after the disaster in an article from NPR.
Across the world, landslides cause thousands of deaths per year. Because of this, authorities of mountain towns carefully monitor situations and potentially dangerous hazards that could cause landslides. They monitor changes in landscape, land movement, weather patterns, and other factors that may trigger a landslide. This time, it was the movement of a rock mass that caused authorities in Brienz/Brinzauls to evacuate the village.
As climate change continues to accelerate and effect weather patterns, the erosion of rock may become accelerated in different places all over the world. This may lead to more frequent landslides, mudslides, glacier movements, and other potentially dangerous events. Because of this, it is important to continue to pay attention to local advisories and to be prepared in the event of a disaster like this.
