Massive snowfall occurred all over the Swiss Alps during three periods in February 1999, leading to a total amount of fresh fallen snow of several metres across the Swiss Alps. During and shortly after these three periods, major avalanche activity was recorded with a main peak after the third period. More than 1,000 disastrous avalanches occurred, causing damage to people, settlements, property, forest, road and railway  infrastructures. Since the last major avalanche winter in 1951, Switzerland has spent more than € 1 billion to protect people and property. The post-event analysis revealed that in most cases the measures taken since 1951 showed an efficient behaviour. Some deficiencies occurred in the context of the organisational measures. The paper discusses the efficiency of the existing measures (see also Ammann and Fohn, 1999) and lists new projects which have been started in Switzerland as a consequence after February 1999. A major effort is put on an in-depth education of the security responsibles in the communities and on an improved crisis management.