Glacier Collapse Buries Swiss Village That Voted Against Climate Change Policies
Rubble from the village of Blatten, Switzerland, May 30, 2025. Photo: X/ @ActisAndres
May 30, 2025 Hour: 2:23 pm
In this European country, Alpine glaciers alone lost 10% of their volume between 2022 and 2023.
On Wednesday, the Swiss village of Blatten was buried under an avalanche of ice, rocks and mud triggered by the melting of a nearby glacier. However, its residents were saved thanks to an early warning system.
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“Neither the landscape nor the village will ever be the same again, but this showed how we can use forecasts and alerts to save lives,” said Clare Nullis, spokesperson for the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
Between 2022 and 2024, scientists recorded the fastest retreat of glaciers ever observed on the planet. Based on global data compiled during this period, the World Glacier Monitoring Service estimates that glaciers have lost more than 9 trillion tons of ice.
“That’s equivalent to a gigantic mass of ice the size of Germany and 25 meters thick,” Nullis said, adding that Alpine glaciers alone lost 10% of their volume between 2022 and 2023.
In Blatten, located in the canton of Valais, the threat remains. But now it comes not from the Birch Glacier, which destroyed the village two days ago, but from a lake formed by the waters of the Lonza River, now blocked by debris that tumbled down from the heights.
Paradoxically, the residents of this Swiss village had ignored scientific warnings about the imminent consequences of climate change.
Earlier this year, the Green Party brought a proposal to referendum titled “For a Responsible Economy Within the Limits of Our Planet,” which aimed to introduce consumption restrictions to increase the sustainability of human societies.
The question “Should the Swiss economy respect the planet’s limits?” was put to voters in 23 Swiss cantons. More than 2.1 million citizens cast their ballots, and 69.7% rejected the initiative. In Blatten, the rejection was nearly unanimous: 91% of voters said “No.”
“The rejected proposal aimed to adjust the Swiss economy to global limits within ten years. The core idea was to limit consumption to what the planet can regenerate. The government, parliament and business circles all urged people to vote no,” recalled Argentine journalist Andres Actis.
“The concept of planetary boundaries defines nine thresholds that must not be crossed in order for humanity to live within a safe ecosystem. These limits include climate change, biodiversity loss, freshwater use, land use, nitrogen and phosphorus emissions, ocean acidification, atmospheric aerosols, ozone layer depletion and chemical pollution,” he explained.
So far, Earth has already crossed six of those nine planetary boundaries, according to the 2024 Planetary Health Check Report.
teleSUR/ JF
Sources: EFE – PHCR