Start of winter in Switzerland – More snowfall until Monday night – News

12/07/2020 Sports, Switzerland

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Heavy snow is likely to continue into Monday night in some places.
The large amount of fresh snow in the south has led to a high avalanche risk in the Ticino mountains, southern Grisons and in the Upper Engadine.
Road and rail traffic is affected in many places.

According to SRF Meteo, it will continue to snow in Switzerland until around Monday night. The snow line falls in Ticino at 600 to 800 meters. This means that there is still a great danger of avalanches.

In some areas of Ticino, in the south of Graubünden and in the Engadine, the snow has fallen almost without interruption since the early hours of Friday. Sometimes the snow turned to rain.

The police of the canton of Graubünden had to move on Saturday and Sunday due to 25 traffic accidents. Most of the accidents were minor, the majority of which were sheet metal damage in relation to winter road conditions. A car ran off the road in Laax on Saturday night. All three inmates, including a young child, were taken to Ilanz Hospital for medical examination.

In the canton of St. Gallen there were more than a dozen auto accidents with material damage between Saturday and Sunday.

In much of Ticino, throughout Graubünden, but also in parts of central and eastern Switzerland, more snowfall, sometimes heavy, should be expected until early Monday morning. Another 10 to 40 centimeters of fresh snow are added. The heaviest snowfall should end on Monday afternoon.

Large amounts of snow created problems for the Matterhorn Gotthard Bahn, among other things, which reported a line disruption between Andermatt and Sedrun on Twitter on Sunday morning. At 10 o’clock the problem was solved. However, the Furka carrier vehicle between Oberwald VS and Realp UR was suspended on Sunday until further notice. The reason for this was the closure of the road between Realp and Hospental due to the danger of avalanches.

The Rhaetian Railway (RhB) reported several line interruptions on Sunday. Therefore, the route between Schanf and Scuol-Tarasp was interrupted due to the risk of snow slides. Due to the danger of avalanches, the RhB closed the Bernina line between Pontresina and Poschiavo on Saturday night. Since the road was also closed, replacement buses could not be used.

SBB stopped rail traffic between Chur and Arosa on Sunday afternoon due to heavy snowfall.

Great risk of avalanches

On Sunday, the Snow and Avalanche Research Institute (SLF) reported the second highest danger level 4 for northern Ticino, the Calanca valley and the Misox, from Bergell to the Bernina pass, as well as in Poschiavo and much of the Engadine.

Otherwise, there would be considerable avalanche hazard (level 3) or moderate avalanche hazard (level 2). Large amounts of fresh snow and heavy snowdrifts were the main hazard in hazard level 4 areas.

According to the SLF, many spontaneous medium to large avalanches are expected. On steep and shady slopes, very large individual avalanches can be expected above 2400 meters. Exposed traffic routes are at risk. According to the SLF, individual winter sports enthusiasts could easily trigger avalanches. Conditions are critical for ski tours, freeride and snowshoeing on the slopes.

Accidents and blackouts

The large amount of fresh snow has already caused numerous deteriorations in the last two days, not only in the Alps. There were also numerous traffic accidents in the lowlands, for example in the canton of Bern on the night of Saturday 12.

And due to heavy snowfall, the power was cut off three times in parts of Graubünden since Friday. Hundreds of people were affected.