Last November, the three provincial governors officially launched the Euregio Avalanche Report website. This bundles all avalanche information from the affected regions and displays it on one website. How did the joint avalanche forecast of Tyrol, South Tyrol and Trentino come about?
The starting point for this project was laid some time ago. With the first presidency of Tyrol within the European Region Tyrol - South Tyrol - Trentino, ideas for joint projects were sought. Rudi Mair, head of the Tyrolean avalanche warning service, had already put forward the idea of a joint avalanche situation report to the Tyrolean governor and thus got the ball rolling. After some time, Norbert then wrote a funding application with the help of Matthias Fink, who represents the European region of Tyrol - South Tyrol - Trentino in the province of Tyrol, and successfully got it through. The starting point for the development of the joint avalanche forecast was set. With many ideas, workshops and many intensive technical discussions, a concept emerged that on the one hand followed European standards and guidelines in avalanche warning, but also placed great value on a certain general validity and scalability. This gave us a theoretical framework that we could always fall back on during practical implementation.
Who was involved in the Euregio Avalanche Report project?
The project group is quite large and comprises between 15 and 20 people. The hardcore operative project group consists of the two of us and our colleague Alex Boninsegna in Bolzano. The project is administratively supported by the European Region Tyrol - South Tyrol - Trentino. The avalanche warning services of the three countries and the University of Vienna with the Institute for Geography and Regional Research were also involved. We were also able to work with many interesting partners from science and development as well as innovative companies. The range of partners extended from weather services and snow research institutes to web design and interpreting and translation agencies. This meant that we had a large number of players, but we were also often lucky enough to have specialists in a wide range of areas, which increased the quality of the project.