In the last few days there have been two landslides that have led to searches in the hope of finding buried victims. The higher profile slide was this one that occurred in the Bukit Antarabangsa suburb of Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) on Saturday (pictures from The Star): This landslide, which has dominated the news in Malaysia over the last few days, killed four people and injured a further 15. One person …

Blast on the problem slope on Highway 97 (from CBCnews) Attempts to deal with the slope problem on Highway 97 in Canada continue in a quietly controlled manner, and there are now some signs of success. The focus continues to be upon small blasts at the head of the slope to remove material, which is then transferred to the toe to support the mass and to protect the highway. The …

Thanks to Andrew Giles for bringing this one to my attention. Highway 97 in British Columbia is currently being upgraded through the Okanagan Valley (Fig. 1). This project is being undertaken by Arthon – their project website describes this as: “Four lane roadworks and 1,000,000 m3 rock removal over a 7 km section of BC’s main north-south highway corridor. The B.C. Ministry of Transportation awarded Arthon Contractors Inc. a $38.6 …

12th May @ 07:27 UT: News reports this morning are suggesting that there has been a large, shallow earthquake in Sichuan Province, China. Initial estimates from the USGS are that this was a M = 7.5 (NB this has now been corrected to MW=7.9) event located at just 10 km, although clearly this will need updating. If so, it is reasonable to assume that this earthquake will have triggered large …