Debris-flow hazards caused by hydrologic events at Mount Rainier, Washington

Vallance, James W.; Cunico, Michelle; Schilling, Steve P.

doi:10.3133/ofr03368

Cited by 14 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 8 publications

(5 reference statements)

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“…In addition, Rainier has produced several large lahars over the last 10,000 years, most recently ~500 cal year B.P. [ Sisson and Vallance , ], that have reached what are now heavily populated areas in the Puget Lowlands [ Vallance et al ., ; Wood and Soulard , ]. For these reasons, Mount Rainier is considered a very high threat volcano [ Ewert et al ., ] and is one of the better seismically monitored volcanoes in the Cascade Range.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evidence for fluid‐triggered slip in the 2009 Mount Rainier, Washington earthquake swarm

Shelly

Moran

Thelen

2013

Geophysical Research Letters

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[1] A vigorous swarm of over 1000 small, shallow earthquakes occurred 20-22 September 2009 beneath Mount Rainier, Washington, including the largest number of events ever recorded in a single day at Rainier since seismic stations were installed on the edifice in 1989. Many events were only clearly recorded on one or two stations on the edifice, or they overlapped in time with other events, and thus only~200 were locatable by manual phase picking. To partially overcome this limitation, we applied waveform-based event detection integrated with precise double-difference relative relocation. With this procedure, detection and location goals are accomplished in tandem, using cross-correlation with continuous seismic data and waveform templates constructed from cataloged events. As a result, we obtained precise locations for 726 events, an improvement of almost a factor of 4. These event locations define a~850 m long nearly vertical structure striking NNE, with episodic migration outward from the initial hypocenters. The activity front propagates in a manner consistent with a diffusional process. Double-couple-constrained focal mechanisms suggest dominantly near-vertical strike-slip motion on either NNW or ENE striking faults, more than 30 different than the strike of the event locations. This suggests the possibility of en echelon faulting, perhaps with a component of fault opening in a fracture-mesh-type geometry. We hypothesize that the swarm was initiated by a sudden release of high-pressure fluid into preexisting fractures, with subsequent activity triggered by diffusing fluid pressure in combination with stress transfer from the preceding events.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evidence for fluid‐triggered slip in the 2009 Mount Rainier, Washington earthquake swarm

Shelly

Moran

Thelen

2013

Geophysical Research Letters

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“…After Hürlimann et al (2006) two types of assessment studies on a regional scale and studies on a local scale were conducted. The majority of authors study debris flow hazard on a regional scale with the geographic information system (GIS), in combination with statistical analysis, simple dynamic methods and interpretation of satellite images or aerial photographs (Mark, Ellen, 1995;Iverson et al, 1998;Guzzetti et al, 1999;Hofmeister et al, 2002;Lin et al, 2002;Huggel et al, 2003;Liu, Lei, 2003;Vallance et al, 2003;Pallas et al, 2004). On a local scale, comprehensive field work is necessary to determine the hazard in the debris flows' deposition areas (García et al, 2003;Chau, Lo, 2004;Pasuto, Soldati, 2004).…”

Section: Debris Flow Hazards and Their Relation To Clime Changes And mentioning

confidence: 99%

Impact of Water-Induced Processes on the Development of Tarns and Their Basins in the High Tatras

Tomko-Králo

Hreško

Jakab

2017

Ekológia (Bratislava)

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Tomko-Králo D., Hreško J., Jakab I.: Impact of water-induced processes on development of the tarns and their basins in the High Tatras. Ekológia (Bratislava), Vol. 36, No. 3, p. 247-267, 2017. In the report we concentrate on the influences of water-induced morphodynamic processes and surface flow on the development of tarns in alpine environment conditions of selected valleys in the High Tatras. Model areas are represented by higher basins parts in the Malá Studená valley and the Veľká Studená valley, where we confirmed that slope-gravitational processes in the form of rockfall, water-gravitational processes in the form of debris flows, but also fluvial-proluvial processes as the accumulation of the soft fractions from the area of debris cones take part in the material deposition in the tarns. In this context we focused on the creation of the model of spatial distribution of the water-induced potential of material deposition in drainage tarn basins. The model includes three basic factors: slope and curvature of the relief and land cover character. Map processing with GIS technologies was done on the basis of a 3-D relief model, which allowed the locating of the local erosion bases areas, where the material could be accumulated. The achieved results confirmed the hypothesis that tarn basin development of the alpine environment is subordinated to permanent backfilling as a consequence of the cumulative influence of the several processes connected with rainfall and the runoff regime of the drainage basins.

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“…Large debris fl ows may be triggered by volcanic or seismic activity, and failure of hydrothermally altered rock (Reid et al, 2001) results in a clay content suffi cient to retard dilution and drainage of the fl ow and cause deposition outside of park boundaries, so that lahar deposits from Mount Rainier cover much of the Puget Lowlands (Hoblitt et al, 1995). Smaller debris fl ows caused by hydrologic events do not characteristically exit the park's boundaries (Vallance et al, 2003).…”

Section: Mount Rainier In the Washington Cascadesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There is concern among managers and policymakers that glacier retreat, rising snowline elevations, and more frequent and more intense storms are leading to greater debrisfl ow hazards. On Washington's Mount Rainier in August 2001, rapid melting of Kautz Glacier directed meltwater into the adjacent watershed of Van Trump Creek, incised a new channel, and led to initiation of a series of debris fl ows, which formed a new debris fan in the Nisqually River near the main road into Mount Rainier National Park (Vallance et al, 2002;Vallance et al, 2003). In November 2006, an "atmospheric river" event (Neiman et al, 2008), i.e., a storm track carrying warm, moist air from the tropics, produced heavy rainfall at high elevations with little antecedent snowpack and triggered debris fl ows and fl ooding that caused major damage to infrastructure, particularly on Mount Hood in Oregon and Mount Rainier in Washington.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Periglacial debris-flow initiation and susceptibility and glacier recession from imagery, airborne LiDAR, and ground-based mapping

Lancaster¹,

Nolin²,

Copeland³

et al. 2012

Geosphere

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Climate changes in the Pacifi c Northwest, USA, may cause both retreat of alpine glaciers and increases in the frequency and magnitude of storms delivering rainfall at high elevations absent signifi cant snowpack, and both of these changes may affect the frequency and severity of destructive debris fl ows initiating on the region's composite volcanoes. A better understanding of debrisfl ow susceptibility on these volcanoes' slopes is therefore warranted. Field mapping and remote sensing data, including airborne light detection and ranging (LiDAR), were used to locate and characterize initiation sites of six debris fl ows that occurred during an "atmospheric river" event (warm wet storm) on Mount Rainier, Washington, in November 2006, and data from prior studies identifi ed six more debris fl ows that occurred in 2001-2005. These 12 debris fl ows had initiation sources at the heads of 17 gullies distributed over seven distinct initiation zones near the termini of glaciers, and all debris-fl ow initiation sites were located within areas exposed by glacier retreat in the past century. Gully locations were identifi ed by their steep walls and heads on a 1-m digital elevation model (DEM) from LiDAR data collected in 2007-2008. Gullies in which debris fl ows initiated were differentiated from numerous non-initiating gullies primarily by the greater upslope contributing areas of the former. Initiation mechanisms were inferred from pre-and post-2006 gully width measurements from aerial photos and the LiDAR DEM, respectively, fi eld observations of gully banks, and elevation changes calculated from repeated LiDAR, and these data indicate that debris fl ows were initiated by distributed sources, including bank mass failures, related to ero-sion by overland fl ow of water. Using gullyhead initiation sites for debris fl ows that occurred during 2001-2006, a data model was developed to explore the viability of the method for characterization of debris-fl ow initiation susceptibilities on Mount Rainier. The initiation sites were found to occupy a restricted part of the four-dimensional space defi ned by mean and standard deviation of simulated glacial meltwater fl ow, slope angle, and minimum distance to an area of recent (1994-2008) glacier retreat. The model identifi es the heads of most gullies, including all sites of known debris-fl ow initiation, as highsusceptibility areas, but does not appear to differentiate between areas of varying gullyhead density or between debris-fl ow and no-debris-fl ow gullies. The model and fi eld data, despite limitations, do provide insight into debris-fl ow processes, as well as feasible methods for mapping and assessment of debris-fl ow susceptibilities on periglacial areas of the Cascade Range.

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Debris-flow hazards caused by hydrologic events at Mount Rainier, Washington

Cited by 14 publications

References 8 publications

Evidence for fluid‐triggered slip in the 2009 Mount Rainier, Washington earthquake swarm

Evidence for fluid‐triggered slip in the 2009 Mount Rainier, Washington earthquake swarm

Impact of Water-Induced Processes on the Development of Tarns and Their Basins in the High Tatras

Periglacial debris-flow initiation and susceptibility and glacier recession from imagery, airborne LiDAR, and ground-based mapping

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