An avalanche took away several people near Zermatt on Monday. The emergency services are conducting a massive search for missing people, says the police in the canton of Valais. The avalanche occurred around 2 p.m. in Riffelberg, an area off-piste.
It produced spectacular images, yes. But it is feared that this will have major consequences. Due to heavy snowfall and strong winds in the south of the Alps, there has been a risk of avalanche for several days. “We can expect large to very large avalanches,” an institute for snow and avalanche research said this weekend. The police therefore do not understand why skiers still took such great risks by skiing off-piste.
“A major search is underway. It is not yet known whether there were any fatalities. Major resources have been devoted to the search. A helicopter and sniffer dogs are searching the region,” the police said. There are said to be three missing people, but rescuers themselves do not actually know how many people were at the location and how many were buried.
It is now also getting dark, which makes the search even more difficult.
Last month, five skiers from a family died in the Swiss Alps. A sixth, a woman, is still missing. According to the mountain rescue service, they also took too many risks by ignoring storm warnings.
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Tags: Avalanche takes people Switzerland missing
