Assessing the Prospects of Transboundary Multihazard Dynamics: The Case of Bhotekoshi–Sunkoshi Watershed in Sino–Nepal Border Region

Abstract

The impacts of multihazards have become more pronounced over the past few decades globally. Multiple hazards and their cascading impacts claim enormous losses of lives, livelihoods, and built environment. This paradigm prompts integrated and multidisciplinary perspectives to identify, characterize, and assess the occurrence of multihazards and subsequently design countermeasures considering impending multihazard scenarios at the local level. To this end, we considered one of the most egregious transboundary watersheds, which is regarded as a multihazard hotspot of Nepal, to analyze the underlying causes and cascade scenarios of multihazards, and their associated impacts. In this paper, geophysical, hydrometeorological, and socioeconomic perspectives are formulated to characterize the watershed from the dimension of susceptibility to multihazard occurrence. To characterize the complex dynamics of transboundary multihazard occurrence, insights have been presented from both the Nepali and the Chinese sides. Individual case studies and the interrelation matrix between various natural hazards are also presented so as to depict multihazard consequences in the transboundary region. The sum of the observations highlights that the watershed is highly vulnerable to a single as well as multiple natural hazards that often switch to disasters.

An outlook on the applicability of satellite precipitation products for monitoring extreme precipitation events in Nepal Himalaya

“…The temporal latency of IMERG Early is about 4 h. A representative example of 8/9 July 2020, shown in Figure 4, confirms that the torrential precipitation occurred during the night from 2300h into the early morning 0400h. Due to the continuous torrential precipitation, the river became swollen, and the disaster struck at around 0130h (Lamichhane et al ., 2021). The extreme precipitation did not last for a longer period but was localised in a limited area.…”

“…We also selected the extreme event of 8/9 July 2020, when continuous precipitation triggered multiple landslides and floods in central Nepal (Lamichhane et al ., 2021). The topographical, geological, hydrometeorological, and socio‐economic characteristics of this region can be read in Lamichhane et al .…”

“…The topographical, geological, hydrometeorological, and socio‐economic characteristics of this region can be read in Lamichhane et al . (2021). Similarly, we chose 7 August 2020 as another case study in western Nepal, where a cloudburst event was observed.…”

A Novel Physics‐Aware Machine Learning‐Based Dynamic Error Correction Model for Improving Streamflow Forecast Accuracy

“…Despite several attempts being made to improve the forecast accuracy of streamflow at longer lead times, several practical challenges still remain. These challenges may vary from understanding and modeling the complex underlying physical processes to quantifying the uncertainty induced by the input, model structure, and parameter (Kasiviswanathan et al., 2013, 2016; Kurian et al., 2020; Liu et al., 2015; Pathiraja et al., 2016; Singh et al., 2020; Tajiki et al., 2020; Zhao et al., 2011, 2013).…”

Multi-hazard perception during COVID-19: Evidence from rural communities in West Sumatra, Indonesia

“…Several studies specifically measure the dynamic interaction of cascading phenomena and their characteristics [ [12] , [13] , [14] ]; Suppasri et al, 2021). Of these, the number of studies addressing the more complex cross-border multi-hazard dynamics is still very few [ 15 ]. Experts begin by providing framework to understand cascading, compound, interacting, and interconnected risk to support the implementation of SFDRR [ 13 ].…”