Study of snow climate in the Japanese Alps: Comparison to snow climate in North America

Ikeda, Shinji; Wakabayashi, Ryuzo; Izumi, Kaoru; Kawashima, Koichiro

doi:10.1016/j.coldregions.2009.09.004

Cited by 22 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…Avalanche safety programs in maritime mountain ranges therefore primarily rely on weather observations to assess the likelihood and severity of storm snow avalanches. Examples of mountain ranges with a maritime snow climate include the Canadian Coast Mountains (Haegeli and McClung, 2007), the Cascades and Sierra Nevada in the US (Mock and Birkeland, 2000) and the Japanese sea-side mountains (Ikeda et al, 2009). The continental snow climate exhibits colder temperatures, more frequent periods of clear skies and less snowfall, which produces a thinner snowpack that is conducive to the formation of depth hoar and persistent weak layers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characterizing the nature and variability of avalanche hazard in western Canada

Shandro

Haegeli

2018

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract. The snow and avalanche climate types maritime, continental and transitional are well established and have been used extensively to characterize the general nature of avalanche hazard at a location, study inter-seasonal and large-scale spatial variabilities and provide context for the design of avalanche safety operations. While researchers and practitioners have an experience-based understanding of the avalanche hazard associated with the three climate types, no studies have described the hazard character of an avalanche climate in detail. Since the 2009/2010 winter, the consistent use of Statham et al. (2017) conceptual model of avalanche hazard in public avalanche bulletins in Canada has created a new quantitative record of avalanche hazard that offers novel opportunities for addressing this knowledge gap. We identified typical daily avalanche hazard situations using selforganizing maps (SOMs) and then calculated seasonal prevalence values of these situations. This approach produces a concise characterization that is conducive to statistical analyses, but still provides a comprehensive picture that is informative for avalanche risk management due to its link to avalanche problem types. Hazard situation prevalence values for individual seasons, elevations bands and forecast regions provide unprecedented insight into the inter-seasonal and spatial variability of avalanche hazard in western Canada.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characterizing the nature and variability of avalanche hazard in western Canada

Shandro

Haegeli

2018

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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“…The plot at 1900 m a.s.l. has been classified as having a ‘rainy continental snow climate’ (Ikeda and others, 2009). Since air temperature was not continuously measured at the study sites, we extrapolated data from the Ina weather station (N35°48.5′, E137°58.7′, 674 m a.s.l.)…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Pielmeier and Schneebeli, 2003), as well as snow avalanche climatology in North America (e.g. Armstrong and Armstrong, 1987; Mock and Birkeland, 2000; Haegeli and McClung, 2003) and the central mountains of Japan (Ikeda and others, 2009). The study of mountain snow cover from a hydrological viewpoint began during the 1920s–1930s in Europe, in the 1930s in the western USA, and in the 1950s in Japan (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elevation-dependent behavior of hoar-prominent snowpack on forest slopes in the Japanese Central Alps based on a decade of observations

Harada

Wakabayashi

Inoue³

2018

Ann. Glaciol.

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Full snow-pit observations were performed on a monthly basis over ten winter seasons from 1995 to 2004, at 15 study plots spaced at 100 m elevation intervals (1300–2700 m a.s.l.) in the mountainous forest of the Japanese Central Alps. We observed 514 pits with an average depth of 1.12 m. Density measurements were taken in 2610 snow layers in total. Monthly trends indicate that snow depth has a strong linear correlation with elevation and that the mean density of snow cover has a moderate linear correlation with elevation in midwinter. Snow water equivalent can increase as a quadratic function of elevation in January and February. For this reason, the influence of overburden load and wind packing is elevation-dependent from January to February, a period when a facet-prominent snowpack existed on account of low snow and air temperatures. The density of depth hoar is greater at higher elevations than it is for rounded grains in midwinter due to densification. On forested slopes, with increasing elevation, snowfall frequency and the impact of wind upon snow increases while air temperature decreases, causing elevational variance in grain shapes.

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“…situations (+5 percentage points) and fewer Spring-like hazard situations (−4 percentage points). Among the two winters when bulletins were only available from Avalanche Canada (2009/2011Fig . S3), the 2009/2010 winter stands out due to its extremely high prevalence of Persistent slab avalanche hazard situations (+21 percentage points relative to overall average with Avalanche Canada bulletins only).…”

Section: Typical Hazard Situation Prevalence: Inter-seasonal Variabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Reply to Sergey Sokratov's response

Shandro¹

2018

Preprint

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The snow and avalanche climate types maritime, continental and transitional are well established and have been used extensively to characterize the general nature of avalanche hazard at a location, study inter-seasonal and large-scale spatial variabilities and provide context for the design of avalanche safety operations. While researchers and practitioners have an experience-based understanding of the avalanche hazard associated with the three climate types, no studies have described the hazard character of an avalanche climate in detail. Since the 2009/2010 winter, the consistent use of Statham et al. (2017) conceptual model of avalanche hazard in public avalanche bulletins in Canada has created a new quantitative record of avalanche hazard that offers novel opportunities for addressing this knowledge gap. We identified typical daily avalanche hazard situations using selforganizing maps (SOMs) and then calculated seasonal prevalence values of these situations. This approach produces a concise characterization that is conducive to statistical analyses, but still provides a comprehensive picture that is informative for avalanche risk management due to its link to avalanche problem types. Hazard situation prevalence values for individual seasons, elevations bands and forecast regions provide unprecedented insight into the inter-seasonal and spatial variability of avalanche hazard in western Canada.Published by Copernicus Publications on behalf of the European Geosciences Union.

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Study of snow climate in the Japanese Alps: Comparison to snow climate in North America

Cited by 22 publications

References 8 publications

Characterizing the nature and variability of avalanche hazard in western Canada

Characterizing the nature and variability of avalanche hazard in western Canada

Elevation-dependent behavior of hoar-prominent snowpack on forest slopes in the Japanese Central Alps based on a decade of observations

Reply to Sergey Sokratov's response

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