[1] Coastal regions are increasingly affected by larger storms and rising sea level predicted by global warming models, aggravating the situation in the city of Venice where tidal-induced seasonal flooding coupled with natural and anthropogenic subsidence have been perennial problems. In light of accelerated efforts to protect Venice from the rise in sea level we assess land subsidence in the Venice Lagoon over the last decade. Through a combined analysis of GPS position time series from 2001.55 to 2011.00 for four stations installed by the Magistrato alle Acque di Venezia and thousands of observations of InSAR permanent scatterers using RADARSAT-1 images from 2003.3 to 2007.85, we determine that the northern lagoon subsides at a rate of 2-3 mm/yr, whereas the southern lagoon subsides at 3-4 mm/yr. The city of Venice continues to subside, at a rate of 1-2 mm/yr, in contrast to geodetic studies in the last decade of the 20th Century suggesting that subsidence has been stabilized. The GPS results indicate a general eastward tilt in subsidence and that the natural subsidence rate related to the retreat of the Adriatic plate subducting beneath the Apennines is at least 0.4-0.6 mm/yr. Our combined GPS and InSAR analysis demonstrates high spatial resolution in the vertical direction with a precision of 0.1-0.2 mm/yr with respect to a global reference frame. Continued efforts to secure the city of Venice from flooding must also take into account the significant local and regional subsidence rates as well as the expected rise in sea level.
Deformation in the northern San Francisco Bay area is dominated by a series of sub‐parallel strike‐slip faults. Existing GPS observations provide some constraint on the slip rates of these faults, however these have only limited resolution for resolving shallow fault behavior, such as brittle creep. We use a 30 image Permanent Scatterer InSAR (PS‐InSAR) dataset spanning the time interval 1992–2001 to dramatically increase the density of surface deformation observations. We find a discontinuity in observed surface velocities across the Rodgers Creek fault, around Santa Rosa and further north, consistent with shallow creep at rates of up to 6 mm/yr. The creeping segments are located in areas of local transtension, suggesting that lowered normal stresses may play a role in the distribution of creep. The existence of creep could significantly reduce expected moment release in future earthquakes on the Rodgers Creek fault, and thus has implications for seismic hazard assessment.
Stromboli (Aeolian Archipelago, Italy) is an active volcano that is frequently affected by moderate to large mass wasting, which has occasionally triggered tsunamis. With the aim of understanding the relationship between the geomorphologic evolution and slope instability of Stromboli, remote sensing information from space-born Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) change detection and interferometry (InSAR) and Ground Based InSAR (GBInSAR) was compared with field observations and morphological analyses. Ground reflectivity and SqueeSARâ\u84¢ (an InSAR algorithm for surface deformation monitoring) displacement measurements from X-band COSMO-SkyMed satellites (CSK) were analysed together with displacement measurements from a permanent-sited, Ku-band GBInSAR system. Remote sensing results were compared with a preliminary morphological analysis of the Sciara del Fuoco (SdF) steep volcanic flank, which was carried out using a high-resolution Digital Elevation Model (DEM). Finally, field observations, supported by infrared thermographic surveys (IRT), allowed the interpretation and validation of remote sensing data. The analysis of the entire dataset (collected between January 2010 and December 2014) covers a period characterized by a low intensity of Strombolian activity. This period was punctuated by the occurrence of lava overflows, occurring from the crater terrace evolving downslope toward SdF, and flank eruptions, such as the 2014 event. The amplitude of the CSK images collected between February 22nd, 2010, and December 18th, 2014, highlights that during periods characterized by low-intensity Strombolian activity, the production of materials ejected from the crater terrace towards the SdF is generally low, and erosion is the prevailing process mainly affecting the central sector of the SdF. CSK-SqueeSARâ\u84¢ and GBInSAR data allowed the identification of low displacements in the SdF, except for high displacement rates (up to 1.5 mm/h) that were measured following both lava delta formation after the 2007 eruption and the lava overflows of 2010 and 2011. After the emplacement of the 2014 lava field, high displacements in the central and northern portions of the SdF were recorded by the GBInSAR device, whereas the spaceborne data were unable to detect these rapid movements. A comparison between IRT images and GBInSAR-derived displacement maps acquired during the same time interval revealed that the observed displacements along the SdF were related to the crumbling of newly emplaced 2014 lava and of its external breccia. Detected slope instability after the 2014 flank eruption was related to lava accumulation on the SdF and to the difference in the material underlying the 2014 lava flow: i) lava flows and breccia layers related to the 2002â\u80\u9303 and 2007 lava flow fields in the northern SdF sector and ii) loose volcaniclastic deposits in the central part of the SdF. This work emphasizes the importance of smart integration of spaceborne, SAR-derived hazard information with permanent-sited, operational monitoring by GBI...
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