After a full week on “red alert” because of fears a mountain in Romsdal would collapse into the valley below, Norwegian authorities lowered their warning to “yellow” over the weekend. Residents living just below the unstable mountainside were also allowed to move home.
They’d been evacuated last week when the mountain known as Mannen (The Man) registered alarming movements on the sensitive instruments authorities have placed on it. The mountain has been under constant monitoring for years.
Now the portion of Mannen called Veslemannen (Little Man) is showing more stability. Movements subsided on Saturday and fears that heavy rains in the area would cause a landslide proved unfounded, at least so far.
“It was in the cards that the danger level was declining, also since the weather forecasts now are very good,” geologist Lars Harald Blikra told news bureau NTB. Local mayor Lars Olav Hustad didn’t think the stories about Mannen were over yet, though.
“Compared to 2014 and 2015 (when the mountain also threatened to fall), the biggest slide danger came in late September and early October (after autumn storms),” Hustad said. “So we can quickly have such a situation again later this fall.”
newsinenglish.no staff
