The phrase "an attempt to avert" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used when describing an effort to prevent something undesirable from happening.
Example: "The government made an attempt to avert a financial crisis by implementing new economic policies."
Alternatives: "an effort to prevent" or "a bid to avoid".
In an attempt to avert the ruin of his niece, Flaubert sacrificed his inheritance.
Tomorrow the Federal Reserve is all but certain to cut interest rates in an attempt to avert a recession.
One-and-a-half seconds before impact, the pilots advanced the throttles to get more power in an attempt to avert a crash.
The Securities and Exchange Commission proposed more stringent rules for money market funds on Wednesday in an attempt to avert runs like the one that erupted last fall.
Arnie materialises, nude and smouldering - in the middle of a reboot that will have John Connor Jason Clarkee) hopping timelines in an attempt to avert Judgement Day.
In an attempt to avert disaster, one prominent jury member stripped to the waist and frenziedly wafted the flames with her jacket.
David Cameron pulled a long-awaited report on the Muslim Brotherhood which was due in March, in an apparent attempt to avert a potential row with Saudi Arabia and Egypt.
Now, in a desperate attempt to avert its scrapping, a group calling itself the S.S. United States Conservancy is suggesting that the ship could be a floating hotel and tourist attraction on the Hudson River waterfront.
"The revenue issue is now closed," Mr. Boehner said Thursday, before the House left town for the weekend without acting on the cuts and a Senate attempt to avert them died.
Meanwhile, Indonesian officials continued planning for the execution of Chan and Sukumaran: In a final attempt to avert the death penalty, on 9 February 2015 the lawyers for Chan and Sukumaran launched a rare challenge against the Indonesian president's refusal to grant them pardons; which was dismissed by the Indonesian government a day later.
Israel and Hamas agreed to an Egyptian proposal for a new 72-hour ceasefire on Sunday night in a last-ditch attempt to avert a lengthy war in Gaza.
