Swiss add up cost of heavy rain and floods

Aug 9, 2007, 23:48 GMT

Geneva - Householders and insurers were assessing the cost of damage Thursday after heavy rain caused floods and landslides across Switzerland.

Rainfall eased during the day after reaching record levels overnight in some areas but some lakes and rivers were still at dangerously high levels.

Roads were closed and rail services disrupted from the north to the south. The army and air rescue services were called in to support overstretched fire services in Jura, Aargau and Soluthurn.

Many rivers and lakes burst their banks. The hamlet of Riedes close to Delemont in the Jura was evacuated when the River Birse overflowed.

Residents were moved from homes in Roche close to Lake Geneva in canton Vaud and holidaymakers forced to leave their campsites.

Householders in many parts stood by with sandbags. Homes around Lake Bieler near Biel, in canton Bern, were threatened as water levels reached a new record high.

It rose 1.22 metres in 24 hours surging to more than 40 centimetres above the danger level. Animals at Bern zoo were moved to safety as the River Aare risked flooding.

The Rhine was closed to shipping in Basel as the river reached critical levels

Delemont in Jura, entirely isolated for most of the day, was still mainly cut off.

A number of mountain passes were closed. The Grand-St-Bernard shut as 40 centimetres of snow fell at 2,400 metres with traffic diverted through the tunnel between Switzerland and Italy.

Heavy rain led indirectly to the death of a 66-year-old man in Heimiswil, Bern when he fell down a slurry pit, according to cantonal police. The cover had been swept away by water.

The Swiss weather service MeteoSwiss said record levels of rain had fallen in 24 hours. Zurich saw one of the highest amounts with more than 97 mm in 24 hours, while 94 mm fell at the mountain pass of Chasseral near Bern, 87 mm in Delemont, Jura, and 69 mm in Lausanne.

In Basel, 76 mm fell in just fours hours, according to spokesman Olivier Codeluppi.

The level of alert receded during the afternoon and was back to normal throughout the country Thursday evening.

Insurance companies put the damage at around 60 million francs (50 million dollars) for buildings alone. The figure, however, is not expected to reach anywhere near the 2.5 billion francs' worth of damage inflicted by the serious floods of August 2005.