New insights in the relation between climate and slope failures at high-elevation sites

Paranunzio, Roberta; Chiarle, Marta; Laio, Francesco; Nigrelli, Guido; Turconi, Laura; Luino, Fabio

doi:10.1007/s00704-018-2673-4

Cited by 46 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 56 publications

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“…Precisely dated rockfall events have been investigated from a climate perspective by applying the statistical-based method described in Paranunzio et al (2019). The method is based on an empirical distribution function to determine whether one or more climate variables V have assumed anomalous values prior to the occurrence of a slope failure event.…”

Section: Climatic Analysesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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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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Section: Climatic Analysesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…; Guglielmin et al 2014;Phillips et al 2016;Magnin et al 2017;Weber et al 2017;Mamot et al 2018); ii) a back analysis of the meteorological and climatic conditions associated with the occurrence of slope instability (e.g. Allen and Huggel 2013;D'Amato et al 2016;Nigrelli et al 2018a;Paranunzio et al 2019;Schlögel et al 2020).…”

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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“…In addition to the socio-economic issues to habitability caused by long-term climatological changes, extreme hydrological events, such as floods and droughts, which occur due to large excesses or deficiencies in localised precipitation, often lead to a massive loss of lives as well as livelihoods; consider, also, the non-trivial impacts of changes in the hydroclimate (and, especially, in its extreme events) of mountainous regions on the advent of landslides [18,19]. Such recent devastating events include the 2010, 2013, and 2017 floods of Northern Pakistan (NP), Uttarakhand (U) and Kathmandu (K), respectively.…”

Section: Gauges -Brahmaputramentioning

confidence: 99%

Water Pathways for the Hindu-Kush-Himalaya and an Analysis of Three Flood Events

Boschi¹,

Lucarini

2019

Atmosphere

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The climatology of major sources and pathways of moisture for three locales along the Hindu-Kush-Himalayan region are examined, by use of Lagrangian methods applied to the ERA-Interim dataset, over the period from 1980 to 2016 for both summer (JJA) and winter (NDJ) periods. We also investigate the major flooding events of 2010, 2013, and 2017 in Pakistan, Uttarakhand, and Kathmandu, respectively, and analyse a subset of the climatology associated with the 20 most significant rainfall events over each region of interest. A comparison is made between the climatology and extreme events, in the three regions of interest, during the summer monsoon period. For Northern Pakistan and Uttarakhand, the Indus basin plays the largest role in moisture uptake. Moisture is also gathered from Eastern Europe and Russia. Extreme events display an increased influence of sub-tropical weather systems, which manifest themselves through low-level moisture transport; predominantly from the Arabian sea and along the Gangetic plain. In the Kathmandu region, it is found that the major moisture sources come from the Gangetic plain, Arabian Sea, Red Sea, Bay of Bengal, and the Indus basin. In this case, extreme event pathways largely match those of the climatology, although an increased number of parcels originate from the western end of the Gangetic plain. These results provide insights into the rather significant influence of mid-latitudinal weather systems, even during the monsoon season, in defining the climatology of the Hindu-Kush-Himalaya region, as well as how extreme precipitation events in this region represent atypical moisture pathways. We propose a detailed investigation of how such water pathways are represented in climate models for the present climate conditions and in future climate scenarios, as this may be extremely relevant for understanding the impacts of climate change on the cryosphere and hydrosphere of the region.

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“…However, while there is a theoretical understanding that gravitational hazards respond to changing climate conditions, it is still difficult to detect changes over mountainous regions in the observational records 13,14 , and often the results are contradictory or uncertain 9 . Some researchers 5,[15][16][17] have attempted to analyse the relationship between climatic variables and gravitational hazards (mostly, rock falls and debris flows) in the Alps, particularly in the Italian Alps, mentioning limitations due to complex mountainous systems and incompleteness of records.…”

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Changes in climate patterns and their association to natural hazard distribution in South Tyrol (Eastern Italian Alps)

Schlögel

Kofler

Gariano

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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In Alpine regions changes in seasonal climatic parameters, such as temperature, rainfall, and snow amount have already been observed. Specifically, in the South Tyrol area, meteorological observations indicate that temperatures are increasing and the number of snow days has generally diminished over time with perennial snow line now observed at higher elevations. Changes in rainfall have also been observed with more events associated with higher temperatures in the summer season. Natural hazards-mainly debris and mud flows, landslides, avalanches, rock falls, and (flash) floods-that affect this area every year, damaging population and infrastructures, are either weather or cryosphere-related. While these events have been recorded sporadically since the beginning of the 20th century, a systematic approach of their inventory has been done by local authorities since the 1990s. So far, Earth observation data has not been exploited to complete or complement existing inventories nor have they been used to investigate the influence of climate perturbation on potentially dangerous natural phenomena. The research presented here thus has three objectives: (i) analyse long time series of climate data and hazard occurrence in South Tyrol to examine if these records exhibit a coherent response of hazards to changes in climate; (ii) measure the spatio-temporal evolution of climatic and natural hazard events recorded, and (iii) explore potential relations between meteorological conditions and the hazard occurrence. In this context, in-situ and satellite-based climate data are exploited to study natural hazard triggers while the potential of Earth observation data is evaluated as a complement to the existing historical records of natural hazards. Specifically, Copernicus Sentinel-1 images are used to detect the spatio-temporal distribution of slow earth surface deformations and the results used for checking the completeness of the actual slow-moving landslide inventories. Hazard-related changes in the South tyrolian landscape have also been analysed in relation to particular meteorological events at a regional scale, assessing trends and anomalies. Results show that: (i) satellite data are very useful to complement the existing natural hazard inventories; (ii) in-situ and satellite-based climate records show similar patterns but differ due to regional versus local variability; (iii) even in a data-rich region such as the analysed area, the overall response of natural hazard occurrence, magnitude, and frequency to change in climate variables is difficult to decipher due to the presence of multiple triggers and locally driven ground responses. However, an increase in the average annual duration of rainfall events and debris flow occurrence can be observed. Mountains have been acknowledged as "sentinels of environmental change" because they have physical dynamics that are readily identifiable and respond more rapidly than other geographical entities to environmental change 1 .

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New insights in the relation between climate and slope failures at high-elevation sites

Cited by 46 publications

References 56 publications

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

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

Water Pathways for the Hindu-Kush-Himalaya and an Analysis of Three Flood Events

Changes in climate patterns and their association to natural hazard distribution in South Tyrol (Eastern Italian Alps)

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