Events in 2000 - 2005

14^th October 2000
Storm in Valais
Several debris flows killed 16 people. The most severe event happened in Gondo when the mudslide damed behind a protective wall against rockfall. The wall could not hold the pressure any longer and collapsed. The mixture of water, soil, mud and parts of the protection wall (weighing tons) avalanching down now destroyed within seconds one third of the village. In Stalden-Neubruegg the Breiter torrent– most probably dammed by a landslide – washed away four houses and killed two people. Near Martigny a woman was buried in her car underneath the mud and was brought out of the mud dead. As everything happened so fast, there was no time for warning (which is given usually with flooding, due to the slow ascending of water level).

31 August / 01 September 2002
Landslide in Lutzenberg (Appenzell Outer Rhodes)
Stationary and intensive storms, involving considerable volumes of precipitation, in part, arose in the northern Pre-Alps of central and east Switzerland. Numerous instances of flooding and landslides occurred as a result. A landslide which demolished a house occurred on the night of 31 August/1 September in Lutzenberg in the Canton of Appenzell Outer Rhodes. There were three fatalities as a result of this event.

May-October 2003
Heat Wave Summer 2003
The summer of 2003 was one of the hottest of the past century throughout Europe. In Switzerland, the temperatures recorded for the meteorological summer (mean for the months of June, July and August) were 4-5.5°C higher than the long-term mean value for the period 1864-2003. The drought of 2003 was not a phenomenon limited to the summer, however, it started in February and lasted in some regions until October or November. In meteorological terms, the heat and drought between May and October 2003 can be explained by the extreme frequency of subtropical high-pressure areas over Central Europe which exerted an almost permanent influence on the continent’s weather. The effects of the heat were clearly evidenced in Switzerland by the almost 1,000 fatalities caused; the number of fatalities caused by the heat wave for all of Europe is estimated at as many as 35,000. Other effects of the heat wave summer were failed harvests, animal feed scarcities, low water and ground-water levels and high temperatures resulting in water shortages and fish death, and the thawing of the permafrost soils which resulted in a large number of rockfall events.

1 August 2003
Leuk forest fire (Valais)
During the heat wave summer of 2003 a forest fire broke out in a forest above Leuk in the canton of Valais. Local winds ensured the rapid spread of the fire in the arid forest. The villages of Albinen, Leuk and some hamlets were at risk from the fire and people had to be evacuated from them. The fire destroyed approximately 450 ha of forest. The fire area extended from 800 m asl to the forest line at 2,100 m asl. Approximately 60 ha of the affected forest was protective forest which provided avalanche and rockfall protection to Leuk and the road to Leukerbad.

21/22 August 2005
Floods in Switzerland
In August 2005, torrential rain fell across wide areas on the northern slopes of the Alps, in some instances more rain fell than had ever been seen in Switzerland since records began. Lake levels reached record highs, rivers and streams generated extraordinary levels of discharge and landslides occurred on slopes. The main damage processes were flooding, erosion, overbank sedimentation, landslides and debris flows. The flood of August 2005 in Switzerland claimed the lives of six people and caused material damage totalling CHF 3 billion. Approximately 900 communes were affected and locations like Engelberg and Lauterbrunnen remained cut off for days. Overall, and viewed from a longer-term perspective, however, this event can at best be described as rare rather than extraordinary.