{"id":26033,"date":"2017-10-30T07:17:28","date_gmt":"2017-10-30T07:17:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/?p=26033"},"modified":"2017-10-30T07:17:28","modified_gmt":"2017-10-30T07:17:28","slug":"landslide-density-puerto-rico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/2017\/10\/30\/landslide-density-puerto-rico\/","title":{"rendered":"USGS mapping of landslide density for failures triggered by Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico"},"content":{"rendered":"<h4>USGS mapping of landslide density for failures triggered by Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico<\/h4>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/landslides.usgs.gov\/research\/featured\/2017-maria-pr\/\">USGS has now posted online a map<\/a> of the landslide density for failures triggered by Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico in September 2017, following on from their earlier work on <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/2017\/10\/05\/hurricane-maria-1\/\">landslide impacts<\/a>. The mapping has been undertaken using high resolution satellite images.\u00a0 At this stage the mapping has been undertaken on a grid square basis, with each square having an area of 4 km\u00b2, with a simple three-fold classification of no landslides, fewer than 25 landslides per km\u00b2, and more that 25 landslides per km\u00b2.\u00a0 The resultant map is shown below:-<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_26038\" style=\"width: 650px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-26038\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26038\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/files\/2017\/10\/17_10-Puerto-Rico-1-e1509345340646.jpg\" alt=\"landslide density\" width=\"640\" height=\"455\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-26038\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">USGS mapping of landslide density in Puerto Rico as a result of Hurricane Maria<\/p><\/div>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<p>A simple comparison with the topography of Puerto Rico suggests that, at a first order, the landscape has been a key control on the occurrence of landslides (map via <a href=\"https:\/\/geog.ufl.edu\/alumni-2\/hernandez-ayala\/#prettyPhoto\">Dr Jose Javier Hernandez Ayala<\/a>):-<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_26041\" style=\"width: 650px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-26041\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26041\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/files\/2017\/10\/17_10-Puerto-Rico-2-e1509345620390.jpg\" alt=\"landslide density\" width=\"640\" height=\"385\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-26041\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">The topography of Puerto Rico. Map by <a href=\"https:\/\/geog.ufl.edu\/alumni-2\/hernandez-ayala\/#prettyPhoto\">Dr Jose Javier Hernandez Ayala<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/graphics\/2017\/national\/maria-puerto-rico\/?utm_term=.04b3e3ca780a\">The Washington Post published a map<\/a> of the precipitation deposited by Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico:<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_26043\" style=\"width: 650px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-26043\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26043\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/files\/2017\/10\/17_10-Puerto-Rico-3-e1509346038150.jpg\" alt=\"landslide density\" width=\"640\" height=\"300\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-26043\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Total precipitation from Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, via the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/graphics\/2017\/national\/maria-puerto-rico\/?utm_term=.04b3e3ca780a\">Washington Post<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<p>This suggests that the landslide distribution can be primarily explained by the coincidence of intense precipitation and steep topography, which is of course unsurprising.\u00a0 I am sure that a more detailed analysis will be undertaken in due course. The upshot is a profoundly altered landscape.\u00a0 This is a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.planet.com\/\">Planet Labs image<\/a> of the area around Lago Caonillas taken on 12th September 2017, about a week before Hurricane Maria:-<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_26051\" style=\"width: 650px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-26051\" class=\"wp-image-26051 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/files\/2017\/10\/17_10-Puerto-Rico-4-e1509347048476.jpg\" alt=\"landslide density\" width=\"640\" height=\"514\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-26051\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.planet.com\/\">Planet Labs image<\/a> of the area around Lago Caonillas in Puerto Rico, collected on 12th September 2017<\/p><\/div>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<p>And this is the same area, after the storm, on 4th October 2017:-<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_26047\" style=\"width: 650px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-26047\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26047\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/files\/2017\/10\/17_10-Puerto-Rico-5-e1509347174761.jpg\" alt=\"landslide density\" width=\"640\" height=\"515\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-26047\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.planet.com\/\">Planet Labs image<\/a> of the area around Lago Caonillas in Puerto Rico, collected on 4th October 2017<\/p><\/div>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<h4>References<\/h4>\n<p>Erin K. Bessette-Kirton, Jeffrey A. Coe, Jonathan W. Godt, Jason W. Kean, Francis K. Rengers, William H. Schulz, Rex L. Baum, Eric S. Jones, and Dennis M. Staley (2017).\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/landslides.usgs.gov\/research\/featured\/2017-maria-pr\/\">October 25, 2017: Map data showing concentration of landslides caused by Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico<\/a>. USGS: https:\/\/landslides.usgs.gov\/research\/featured\/2017-maria-pr\/<\/p>\n<p>Planet Team (2017). Planet Application Program Interface: In Space for Life on Earth. San Francisco, CA.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/api.planet.com\/\">https:\/\/api.planet.com<\/a><\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The USGS has now published provisional maps of landslide density for failures triggered by Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":26047,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[173,469,67,959,737],"class_list":["post-26033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-landslide-images","tag-caribbean","tag-featured","tag-hurricane","tag-landslide-report","tag-puerto-rico"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26033"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26033\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26047"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}