Bassersdorf

Bassersdorf is a municipality in the Swiss canton of Zurich, in the district of Bulach, on the edge of the middle Glatt Valley halfway between the cities of Zurich and Winterthur. Its name, first recorded in 1155 as Bazzelstorf, combines the common Alemannic place-name element dorf, meaning hamlet or village, with the genitive of a personal name. The Alemannic settlement dates to the eighth or ninth century, and the village gained some importance as a relay stop on the road between the two cities during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Under the Helvetic Republic between 1798 and 1803 it was a district capital. The village of Baltenswil has belonged to the municipality since 1931. The area is about nine square kilometres, of which a little over forty percent is farmland and almost a third forest. Zurich Airport lies close by, and on 24 November 2001 Crossair Flight 3597 crashed into a hill short of the runway here, killing twenty-four of the thirty-three people aboard.