Saas-Grund is a municipality in the district of Visp in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. It lies east of Lenzspitze and Dom. History Saas-Grund is first mentioned in 1438 as grunderro. On 3rd April 1849, an avalanche destroyed a house that served as a refuge in avalanche-prone weather, and killed 19 people. After that winter, each building that abutted the hill was extended with a vault, a Lawinengruft. Each of these underground refuges was about 5 meters x 4 meters large, and had an interior height of 2.5 meters. In 1943, the Swiss Alpine Club's magazine Die Alpen reported that they were last used in the winter of 1887/1888, and only two of them were remaining. As these vaults served several families, each modification to the vault had to be done with the co-owner's agreement. Geography Saas-Grund has an area, , of . Of this area, 11.0% is used for agricultural purposes, while 12.5% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 1.3% is settled (buildings or roads) and 75.2% is unproductive land. The municipality is located in the Visp district. It consists of the village of Saas-Grund, the hamlets of Unter dem Berg and Ze Laubinu and portions of the hamlets of Tamatten and Unter den Bodmen. Coat of arms The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Vert, a bend wavy Argent in chief three Billets Or one and two, in base a Chapel Argent and a Billet Or. Demographics Saas-Grund has a population () of . , 12.7% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000–2010 ) the population has changed at a rate of -10.2%. It has changed at a rate of -10.4% due to migration and at a rate of -0.2% due to births and deaths. Most of the population () speaks German (1,068 or 91.5%) as their first language, Serbo-Croatian is the second most common (35 or 3.0%) and Albanian is the third (35 or 3.0%). There are 3 people who speak French, 11 people who speak Italian. Of the population in the municipality, 713 or about 61.1% were born in Saas-Grund and lived there in 2000. There were 210 or 18.0% who were born in the same canton, while 73 or 6.3% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 137 or 11.7% were born outside of Switzerland. , children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up