Storms batter Switzerland for second night

The river Jurrassienes was heavily swollen by overnight rain while another waterway burst its banks in canton Jura. RTS-SWI

Torrential rain continued to hit Switzerland for a second night running, this time focusing on the north-western canton of Jura. Villages in the area were flooded as the river Schuelte burst its banks and several roads were closed.

The heavy rainfall also affected parts of eastern Switzerland. It was responsible for an avalanche and landslide that cut off the St Bernard Pass in canton Valais overnight – which reopened during the morning. No fatalities or injuries have been reported.

Jura took the brunt of the downpour where more than 100 firefighters spent the night pumping out flooded cellars. Some 76 millimetres of rain fell on Movelier overnight, according to the authorities. The villages of Courroux and Vicques were left practically unreachable by road on Wednesday morning.

+ Flooding, power outages and road blockages

MeteoSwiss, the national weather service, expected rain to move into Alpine regions and continue throughout the morning before abating later this afternoon.

Tuesday marked the second straight night of heavy rain and stormy weather in Switzerland. On Tuesday evening Geneva received a major downpour with flooding in Genthod, Versoix and Veyrier.

On Monday night, storms caused severe disruption in Lausanne, flooding streets and houses and cutting some rail lines. 

The police received over 500 emergency calls and the fire service responded to 240 incidents on Monday alone. There were no reports of people being injured that night.

MeteoSwiss measured 14.5 millimetres of rain per hour in the Lausanne region at midnight. The public broadcaster SRF Meteo said a record 41.1mm of rain fell in Lausanne in a ten-minute period at around 11pm on Monday. The previous ten-minute record was 36.1mm in Eschenz, canton Thurgau, in 2017.

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