Switzerland



Crowds gather to see chunk fall off Eiger

A vast chunk of Europe's most ill-famed mountain threatens to break loose and crash down in the next few days, a geologist monitoring the situation told the Guardian on Friday.

Hans-Rudolf Keusen said 2m cubic metres of the Eiger in the Bernese Alps, Switzerland - twice the volume of the Empire State Building - was rapidly working its way loose. He said the mountain appeared to have cracked open as an indirect result of global warming.

There was no danger to human beings. "There aren't any houses underneath, so no one is going to end up getting a rock on the head," Mr Keusen said.

I was very sad to read this, my famliy has visited Switzerland many times, my father particularly. The Jungfrau Region of Switzerland is absolutely stunning and the three peaks of The Eiger, Jungfrau and Mönch its symbols.