Helicopter and drone crews have flown over the Italian Alps in search of 13 people still missing after a piece of a mountain glacier sank, killing at least seven.
Key points:
-
Rising temperatures linked to climate change are being blamed for the disaster
-
The avalanche took place in the Marmolada, which is the highest peak in the Dolomites
-
At least seven people died in the avalanche
Disaster experts linked Sunday’s sinking (local time) to rising temperatures, as much of Italy has occurred in an early summer heat wave.
Scientists said climate change was making the behavior of previously stable glaciers more difficult to predict.
The avalanche took place in the Marmolada, which at more than 3,300 meters, is the highest peak in the Dolomites, a mountain range in the eastern Italian Alps straddling the regions of Trento and Veneto.
Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said the disaster was related to environmental factors.
“Today Italy is mourning for these victims,” Draghi said during a visit to meet the rescue teams.
“But the government needs to think about what has happened and take steps to ensure that what happened is unlikely to happen again or even be avoided,” he added.
The president of the Trento region, Maurizio Fugatti, said seven people died as a result of the collapse of the glacier and two of the eight people injured were in serious condition.
Among the missing were three people from the Czech Republic. An Austrian tourist who had been reported missing had since been located, local authorities said.
“This is the first such accident in the history of the mountain,” said Gino Comelli, who was helping coordinate rescue efforts.
The peak was too unstable for rescuers to try to approach on foot, Comelli said, adding that the recent hot weather had been a factor in the collapse.
The independent ice block is estimated to be 200 m wide, 80 m high and 60 m deep. (Autonomous Province of Trento via AP)
Pope Francis said he was praying for the victims and their families.
“The tragedies we are experiencing with climate change should urgently force us to seek new avenues that respect people and nature,” he said on Twitter.
Rising average temperatures have caused the Marmolada glacier, like many others around the world, to shrink steadily over the past few decades.
“The collapse of the Marmolada Glacier is a natural disaster directly related to climate change,” said Poul Christoffersen, a professor of glaciology at Cambridge University.
“High-altitude glaciers like the Marmolada are usually steep and depend on cold temperatures below zero degrees Celsius to keep them stable,” he added.
Authorities are trying to determine how many people may have been walking to the summit. (Cristian Ferrari / Commission Glaciologica Società Alpinisti Tridentini via AP)
Jacopo Gabrieli, a polar science researcher at the state research center of the CNR in Italy, noted that the long heat wave, which covered May and June, was the hottest in northern Italy during this period for almost 20 years.
“It’s absolutely an anomaly,” Gabrieli said Monday in an interview on Italian state television.
Like other experts, he said it would have been impossible to predict when or if a serac, a pinnacle of a glacier overhang, could break, as it did Sunday.
The glacier involved is the largest of the Dolomites in northeastern Italy.
It has been melting rapidly over the past few decades, with much of its volume gone.
Reuters / AP