On Saturday evening on 17 June 2017, a large landslide occurred in northwestern Greenland, around 20 km from the small fishing village of Nuugaatsiaq. Shortly afterwards, waves inundated much of the village, producing widespread destruction - 11 houses were swept out to sea, and four people are missing; in total 200 people have been evacuated from three villages in the region. The slide generated seismic energy visible across the globe, and lit up all stations from the GLISN seismic network, built through an international effort over the last decade with significant funding from the US National Science Foundation, Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland, Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), and eight other international partners.

What damage could earthquakes cause in Switzerland? At present, only a patchy can be given to this important question. Thanks to the Swiss seismic hazard model developed by the Swiss Seismological Service (SED) at ETH Zurich, we know where and how often certain types of earthquake can be expected and how strong the tremors they cause will be at a given location. Yet, it remains largely unclear what damage earthquakes could cause to buildings and infrastructure. The Federal Council has now commissioned the SED, in cooperation with the Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN) and the Federal Office for Civil Protection (FOCP), to plug this gap and devise a seismic risk model by 2022.

On 28 March 2017, in consultation with Basel Industrielle Werke (IWB) the Department of Health of the Canton of Basel decided to re-open the borehole in late June created in Basel as part of the "Deep Heat Mining" geothermal power project 2006. With the support of IWB, the SED has stepped up its seismic monitoring on behalf of the Canton of Basel-Stadt. In addition to routine seismic monitoring, the SED conducts a very thorough daily search for earthquakes near the borehole and automatically transmits the results to the Canton and IWB. These earthquake notifications form the basis of the traffic-light system defined by IWB, which is an important measure for reducing earthquake risk. All detected earthquakes are immediately published on the "List of Earthquakes" page.

Am Dienstag, 6. Juni 2017 ereignete sich um 09:18 Uhr (Lokalzeit) in der Nähe von Schwarzsee (FR) ein leichtes Erdbeben mit einer Magnitude von 3.3. Die Einwohner der Gemeinden in einem Umkreis von rund 30 km haben das Beben verspürt. Auch in den Städten Bern und Fribourg wurde das Beben vereinzelt verspürt. Innerhalb der ersten Stunde nach dem Beben sind von mehr als fünfzig Personen entsprechende Meldungen auf unserer Webseite eingegangen. Schäden sind bei einem Beben dieser Stärke nicht zu erwarten.

In Switzerland, earthquakes are the natural hazard with the greatest potential for causing damage. They cannot currently be prevented or reliably predicted. But, thanks to extensive research, much is now known about how often and how intensely the earth could shake at a given location in the future. Consult a variety of different maps using our interactive web tool to find out how likely certain earthquakes are in Switzerland.

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The Swiss Seismological Service (SED) at ETH Zurich is the federal agency responsible for monitoring earthquakes in Switzerland and its neighboring countries and for assessing Switzerland’s seismic hazard. When an earthquake happens, the SED informs the public, authorities, and the media about the earthquake’s location, magnitude, and possible consequences. The activities of the SED are integrated in the federal action plan for earthquake precaution.

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