the melting of the Aletsch Glacier reveals its buried secrets

The glacier ofAletschlocated in Switzerland, is the largest in the Alps. A frozen river, 23 km long. This giant, which rises at an altitude of 4,000 m, is suffering severely from global warming, and is melting at an unprecedented speed. He retreated nearly a mile in 30 years. The rock of its bed is even bare in places. “He ten years ago, there was still 15 meters of ice, there were really two glaciers that were one. And then today, in 2022, the beginning of summer was still covered in ice, and at the end of summer, we see the moraine starting to come out. It’s sad, but it’s historic“, explains Félicien Rey Balletdirector of Glacier 3000.

As it melts, the ice releases secrets that have been buried, sometimes for decades. In the heart of summer, a guide came across plane wreckage. It was a single-engine Piper, crashed on the glacier on June 30, 1968. To edge found a teacher from Zurich (Swiss) as well as a doctor and his son. The wreckage of the plane remained on the spot, and the investigation had never formally determined the causes of the tragedy. The debris was lowered back into the valley.

Sometimes the glacier also releases bodies, like that of a 27-year-old German mountaineer who has been mysteriously missing since 1990. “For the past ten years, we have had an average of two bodies returned to us by glaciers each year, and in 2022 alone, we have found three bodies.“, reports Steeve Léger, of the cantonal police of Wallis (Swiss)