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Additional Context
Researchers at the WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research (SLF) and ETH Zurich have built a 3D printed physical replica of the terrain around Blatten, the Swiss village nearly destroyed by a rock avalanche in 2025, to study how mixtures of rock, ice and water move across real landscapes. The model, assembled at a scale of 1:577, lets the team trigger miniature avalanches under controlled conditions and use the results to validate the computer models used to assess hazards to settlements and infrastructure.
The project is led by Johan Gaume, head of the Alpine Mass Movements research group at SLF and Associate Professor of Alpine Mass Movements at ETH Zurich. The idea to print a physical model of the Lötschental valley came from Hervé Vicari, a research assistant at SLF.
Rock avala