A rockfall on Interstate 70 between Glenwood Springs and Dotsero, Colorado left large boulders scattered over the highway and severely damaged the pavement. The largest rock weighed an estimated 66 tons. No injuries were reported.
“Although El Salvador’s Volcán San Vicente has not erupted in the past 1,700 years, the mountain is still a hazard. In November 2009, dozens of people living near the volcano, also known as Chichontepec, lost their lives after torrential rains saturated the steep hillsides and unleashed numerous landslides. The landslides triggered lahars—avalanches of mud, boulders, and uprooted trees—that poured down ravines and engulfed small agricultural towns located to the north and northwest of the volcano.” Quoted from the Earth Observatory image release.
Heavy rains caused numerous landslides near the border between Kenya and Uganda. Flooding has ruined roads, bridges, schools and thousands of buildings.
Since 1857 over 500 rockfalls in Yosemite Valley have killed 14 people and injured 62. Now over 200 cabins are off limits to visitors because they are in an area with a high incidence of rockfalls.
Heavy rains on the Portuguese island of Madeira have triggered floods and landslides that have caused significant damage and killed at least 30 people.
A landslide in North Carolina has forced the evacuation of 18 homes and cut off access to many others. Some believe that a property development company is responsible – but the company is bankrupt.
On October 11, 2009 a massive landslide completely blocked the Naches River and Highway 410 near the town of Naches in Yakima County, Washington. Geologists are trying to determine the cause of the slide.
Natural disasters are inevitable, but the severe damage that they sometimes cause is not. Information and preparation are the keys to minimizing destruction in areas with known geologic hazards. Haiti could benefit significantly by incorporating knowledge about earthquakes, landslides, and hurricanes in their rebuilding efforts.
In parts of southern California residents on and at the base of steep slopes that were burned by recent wildfires are being warned about mudslide hazards and advised to evacuate.
Surrounding the epicenter of the recent earthquake in Haiti, many landslide hazard areas have been identified. Images from NASA’s EO-1 satellite show some of the mountaintops that could become compromised, especially by rainfall.
Oregon State University has natural hazards data in an online GIS named the “Oregon Hazards Explorer”. It allows you to navigate the state with different layers turned on such as: landslide areas (shown below), 100 year flood boundaries, coastal erosion hazard areas, seismic hazards, wildfire risk areas and more.
CNN has a short video that shows an apartment complex near Pacifica, California where wave erosion at the base of a cliff has dangerously encroached upon the building. (Note: the video has no sound.)
USGS, NOAA and other organizations developed a prototype debris flow warning system using weather forecasts and precipitation measurements along with regional USGS rainfall rate thresholds to determine the probability of debris flows.
The Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries has new landslide inventory maps for the Canby Quadrangle and a report on coastal erosion in Clatsop County.
A woolly mammoth fossil site in Waco, Texas has been officially opened to the public. Dozens of mammoths that fell victim to a prehistoric flood and landslide were preserved at the location.
This is a video of a rockslide that blocked Highway 64 near milemarker 17.6 in Polk County, Tennessee. The Tennessee Department of Transportation expects the highway to be closed for at least a week.
An article on the Nature.com website reports that USGS researches have linked motion in the Slumgullion landslide of California with changes in air pressure known as “air tides”.
The Department of Planning and Development says that Seattle has about 30 landslides each year and that the landslide season there begins on November 1. This article explores the landslide problem in the city and gives mitigation advice.
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