A massive landslide cut loose on a Swiss mountain Sunday morning, demolishing glacial terrain below and alarming skiers, hikers, and geologists in the area.
About one million cubic meters of rock and ice detached from the north face of 3,970m Piz Scerscen around 7 am on April 14. The rubble plunged into the Tscherva Glacier in Val Roseg, then kept tumbling — eventually covering an area several kilometers long.
The incident started in a spot several hundred meters below the Scerscen summit. No injuries occurred, though climbers and tourists do frequent the location. The landslide “significantly affected” access to two mountain huts under Swiss Alpine Club management, according to several sources.
Woww, brutal!! 😱
7am, 14 April 2024, a large rock avalanche occurred on West face of Piz #Scerscen (3,970m, Bernina) around 3600mhttps://t.co/JwXBTyXEng
~1 million M3 and 5 km runout!
As a frequent visitor to the covered area, just got goose bumps!
Pic SAC Bernina@davepetley
1/ pic.twitter.com/ogrkU7cANh— Melaine Le Roy (@subfossilguy) April 15, 2024
“On first inspection, this appears to be a large collapse…from a steeply inclined rockface,” landslide management expert Dave Petley advised. “This appears to have undergone fragmentation at the foot of the initial slope, to form a long runout rock avalanche.”
Third collapse
The landslide’s impact registered on seismic instruments across the Alps, according to Petley. It’s the third such collapse in three years on Piz Scerscen. Smaller events occurred in 2021 and 2023.
At the end of January 2021, a rock avalanche occurred on the northwest ridge of #PizRoseg at ~3350 m a.s.l. According to @SLFDavos, the volume is estimated to 85000-90000 m3. On its way the RA cut a trench in the tongue of #Tschierva glacier (arrow=lower part of the deposit)
(1/) pic.twitter.com/bNlCpyU7eX— Melaine Le Roy (@subfossilguy) September 9, 2021
As many areas in Europe labor under record heat, mountain visitors will likely face continually unstable rock and ice conditions.
