The Graubünden village of Brienz-Brinzauls has to be evacuated by 1pm on Sunday.
Keystone-SDA
The village of Brienz-Brinzauls in eastern Switzerland, which is threatened by a rockfall, must be evacuated by 1pm on Sunday, the local council has decided. All residents must leave the village. The evacuation is expected to last several months.
+Get the most important news from Switzerland in your inbox
The early warning service of the municipality of Albula, to which the village of Brienz-Brinzauls belongs, analysed the danger situation together with the geology and natural hazards specialist group and other geologists, according to a statement from the municipality.
The precautionary evacuation was ordered on the recommendation of the municipal management team.
+ The deadliest landslides in Swiss history
Since the second half of September, around 1.2 million cubic metres of rock debris have been moving downhill at a rate of 20 to 35 centimetres per day in the scree slope high above Brienz-Brinzauls. According to the press release, there is a risk that it will become loose and then slide down towards the village as a rapid stream of debris.
The municipal council and municipal management staff want to give those affected as much time as possible to evacuate, the press release continued.
Translated from German by DeepL/ts
This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles.
If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, if you want to learn more about how we use technology, click here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to english@swissinfo.ch.
