Switzerland Today

Greetings from Zurich!

Today we take a deep dive into the defences Switzerland is building to mitigate the type of devastation caused by landslides in southern parts of the country earlier this year.

We’ll have more on that below, but first we bring you the most noteworthy news of the day.

Steve Guerdat wins silver at the Paris Olympics Keystone / Laurent Gillieron

In the news: another Swiss Olympic medal, a CHF4bn pension miscalculation and Sudan ceasefire talks.

• Equestrian Steve Guerdat has notched Switzerland’s sixth Olympic medal in Paris with silver in the individual horse jumping contest.
• The interior ministry has launched a probe to determine how the projected costs of future old age pension payments could have been overstated by CHF4 billion.
• US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has called on the Sudanese army to participate in ceasefire talks to be held in Switzerland later this month.
• The Swiss army says it neutralised 280 unexploded ordnance in Switzerland last year, which had largely been discovered by members of the public. 

Debris flow in Lostallo, Graubünden, June 25, 2024. Keystone / Ti-Press / Alessandro Crinari

How to defend against landslides

Several communities were hit by devastating landslides earlier this year, particularly in cantons Graubünden, Ticino and Valais.

Homes and communication links were destroyed, Alpine communities were cut off, at a dozen people were killed or reported missing as storms ravaged southern Switzerland in the early summer.

Amid fears that this could become a more common occurrence, the Swiss authorities and scientists are trying to come up with new ways to protect people and homes.

The current methods of measuring the accumulation of debris in mountain streams and erecting steel mesh fencing are now deemed insufficient to cope with the mounting threat.

The federal technology institute ETH Zurich and the Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research are teaming up to embed artificial intelligence systems into early warning systems to improve the chances of spotting danger points.

Efforts are also being concentrated towards re-drawing outdated natural hazard maps to better identify areas at risk of landslides.

But none of these methods are foolproof, leading to some speculation that people might have to move out of certain valleys in future.

This, of course, does not go down well with people who call these places home. So the hunt goes on for more efficient solutions to protect them from natural disasters.