Landslide response to climate change in permafrost regions

Patton, Annette I.; Rathburn, Sara L.; Capps, Denny M.

doi:10.1016/j.geomorph.2019.04.029

Cited by 185 publications

(102 citation statements)

References 109 publications

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“…Because rock avalanches are common in cryosphericmountainous terrain (e.g., Deline et al, 2015a) that is susceptible to degradation by warming from climate change (e.g., Beniston, 2003;Paul et al, 2004;Gruber and Haeberli, 2007;Fischer et al, 2012;Huss and Hock, 2015;Hock et al, 2019;Patton et al, 2019), studies of ice-degradation processes and their impact on slope stability (e.g., Fischer et al, 2006;Gruber and Haeberli, 2007;Krautblatter et al, 2013), as well as climateinduced changes in rock avalanche recurrence intervals and sizes, are active landslide research frontiers. For mountainous terrain, process research is generally of two types: studies on the degradation of mountain permafrost and the resulting impact on cohesion and pore pressure in rock slopes (e.g., Gruber and Haeberli, 2007), and studies investigating how the reduction and complete removal of glacial ice will impact steep rock slopes that were previously supported by ice (e.g., Grämiger et al, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A 36-Year Record of Rock Avalanches in the Saint Elias Mountains of Alaska, With Implications for Future Hazards

Bessette-Kirton

Coe

2020

Front. Earth Sci.

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Glacial retreat and mountain-permafrost degradation resulting from rising global temperatures have the potential to impact the frequency and magnitude of landslides in glaciated environments. Several recent events, including the 2015 Taan Fiord rock avalanche, which triggered a tsunami with one of the highest wave runups ever recorded, have called attention to the hazards posed by landslides in regions like southern Alaska. In the Saint Elias Mountains, the presence of weak sedimentary and metamorphic rocks and active uplift resulting from the collision of the Yakutat and North American tectonic plates create landslide-prone conditions. To differentiate between the typical frequency of landsliding resulting from the geologic and tectonic setting of this region, and landslide processes that may be accelerated due to changes in climate, we used Landsat imagery to create an inventory of rock avalanches in a 3700 km 2 area of the Saint Elias Mountains. During the period from 1984 to 2019, we identified 220 rock avalanches with a mean recurrence interval of 60 days. We compared our landslide inventory with a catalog of M ≥ 4 earthquakes to identify potential coseismic events, but only found three possible earthquake-triggered rock avalanches. We observed a distinct temporal cluster of 41 rock avalanches from 2013 through 2016 that correlated with above average air temperatures (including the three warmest years on record in Alaska, 2014-2016); this cluster was similar to a temporal cluster of recent rock avalanches in nearby Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve. The majority of rock avalanches initiated from bedrock ridges in probable permafrost zones, suggesting that ice loss due to permafrost degradation, as opposed to glacial thinning, could be a dominant factor contributing to rock-slope failures in the high elevation areas of the Saint Elias Mountains. Although earthquake-triggered landslides have episodically occurred in southern Alaska, evidence from our study suggests that area-normalized rates of non-coseismic rock avalanches were greater during the period from 1964 to 2019, and that the frequency of these events will continue to increase as the climate continues to warm. These findings highlight the need for hazard assessments in Alaska that address changes in landslide patterns related to climate change.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A 36-Year Record of Rock Avalanches in the Saint Elias Mountains of Alaska, With Implications for Future Hazards

Bessette-Kirton

Coe

2020

Front. Earth Sci.

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“…The cryosphere has a key control on high elevation rock slope dynamics (Hasler et al 2011; Haeberli and Whiteman 2015) through a variety of processes, often driven by phase changes of water (Draebing and Krautblatter 2019). For this reason, in high mountain, air temperature and rock temperature play a crucial role in slope dynamics: therefore, climate change, especially climate warming, is thought to have a significant impact on slope stability (Gariano and Guzzetti 2016;Patton et al 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

An integrated approach to investigate climate-driven rockfall occurrence in high alpine slopes: the Bessanese glacial basin, Western Italian Alps

et al. 2020

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Rockfalls are one of the most common instability processes in high mountains. They represent a relevant issue, both for the risks they represent for (infra) structures and frequentation, and for their potential role as terrestrial indicators of climate change. This study aims to contribute to the growing topic of the relationship between climate change and slope instability at the basin scale. The selected study area is the Bessanese glacial basin (Western Italian Alps) which, since 2016, has been specifically equipped, monitored and investigated for this purpose. In order to provide a broader context for the interpretation of the recent rockfall events and associated climate conditions, a cross-temporal and integrated approach has been adopted. For this purpose, geomorphological investigations (last 100 years), local climate (last 30 years) and near-surface rock/air temperatures analyses, have been carried out. First research outcomes show that rockfalls occurred in two different geomorphological positions: on rock slopes in permafrost condition, facing from NW to NE and/or along the glacier margins, on rock slopes uncovered by the ice in the last decades. Seasonal thaw of the active layer and/or glacier debutressing can be deemed responsible for slope failure preparation. With regard to timing, almost all dated rock falls occurred in summer. For the July events, initiation may have been caused by a combination of rapid snow melt and enhanced seasonal thaw of the active layer due to anomalous high temperatures, and rainfall. August events are, instead, associated with a significant positive temperature anomaly on the quarterly scale, and they can be ascribed to the rapid and/or in depth thaw of the permafrost active layer. According to our findings, we can expect that in the Bessanese glacierized basin, as in similar high mountain areas, climate change will cause an increase of slope instability in the future. To fasten knowledge deepening, we highlight the need for a growth of a network of high elevation experimental sites at the basin scale, and the definition of shared methodological and measurement standards, that would allow a more rapid and effective comparison of data.

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“…Affected by global warming and regional geological conditions, the combined effects of permafrost melting, and extreme weather events may induce landslides in permafrost regions (Wang et al, 2018;Patton et al, 2019;Chen et al, 2020). The research team took the Bei'an to the Heihe expressway, to the study area which is located in the southern boundary of the permafrost zone in northeastern China.…”

Section: A Commentary Onmentioning

confidence: 99%

Response: Commentary: The Impact of Climate Change on Landslides in Southeastern of High-Latitude Permafrost Regions of China

Shan

Guo

et al. 2021

Front. Earth Sci.

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Landslide response to climate change in permafrost regions

Cited by 185 publications

References 109 publications

A 36-Year Record of Rock Avalanches in the Saint Elias Mountains of Alaska, With Implications for Future Hazards

A 36-Year Record of Rock Avalanches in the Saint Elias Mountains of Alaska, With Implications for Future Hazards

An integrated approach to investigate climate-driven rockfall occurrence in high alpine slopes: the Bessanese glacial basin, Western Italian Alps

Response: Commentary: The Impact of Climate Change on Landslides in Southeastern of High-Latitude Permafrost Regions of China

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