The man posted the video on social media: “It’s gotten dark, I thought I was going to die”
Text by Raffaella Cagnazzo / CorriereTv
Incredible avalanche in Kyrgyzstan, Friday, July 8th. Nine Britons and one American risked being overwhelmed: they miraculously survived. A man taking part in a guided tour to Dzhuuku Pass, one of the most scenic areas of the Issyk Kul region in the Tian Shan Mountains, filmed the snowfall. Hearing the sound of ice breaking, he began recording, perhaps not realizing that the avalanche was about to reach him. The risk he was taking was enormous, although he made sure he had shelter behind the nearby rocks. The cloud of ice and snow swept over him with crushing force. “It was getting dark, it was difficult to breathe: I thought I might die,” he later said. The rest of the group was further away: all safe, only one participant injured his knee.
The Department of Ecology and Tourism of the Kyrgyz State University explained that the avalanche was a consequence of climate change: the glacier melted due to the high temperatures and part of it collapsed. A study published May 27 in Geophysical Research Letters found that temperatures have increased in Central Asia over the past 35 years, which includes parts of China, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. In some areas, the annual average temperature between 1990 and 2020 was at least 5 °C higher than between 1960 and 1979. In the Tian Shan Mountains, the increase in temperature has been accompanied by an increase in precipitation that took the form of rain rather than snow. The higher temperatures and increased precipitation are contributing to the melting of the ice at high altitudes.
July 10, 2022 – Updated July 10, 2022 10:53 p.m
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