Agencies GENEVA

A huge section of a glacier in the Swiss Alps has broken off, causing a deluge of ice, mud and rock to bury most of a village evacuated earlier this month due to the risk of a rockslide. Drone footage broadcast by Swiss national broadcaster SRF showed a vast plain of mud and soil completely covering part of the village of Blatten, the river running through it and the wooded sides of the surrounding valley.

“What I can tell you at the moment is that about 90% of the village is covered or destroyed, so it’s a major catastrophe that has happened here in Blatten,” Stephane Ganzer, the head of security in the southern Valais region, told local TV channel Canal9.

The regional government said in a statement that a large chunk of the Birch Glacier located above the village had broken off, causing the landslide which as well as covering the village had also buried the nearby Lonza riverbed, raising the possibility of dammed water flows.

“There’s a risk that the situation could get worse,” Ganzer said. “We’ve lost our village,” Matthias Bellwald, the mayor of Blatten told a press conference after the slide.