{"id":3973,"date":"2011-11-29T08:58:06","date_gmt":"2011-11-29T08:58:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/?p=3973"},"modified":"2011-11-29T09:00:56","modified_gmt":"2011-11-29T09:00:56","slug":"on-seismic-signals-from-landslides-new-research","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/2011\/11\/29\/on-seismic-signals-from-landslides-new-research\/","title":{"rendered":"On seismic signals from landslides &#8211; new research"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"float: left;padding: 5px\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.researchblogging.org\"><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"border: 0\" src=\"http:\/\/www.researchblogging.org\/public\/citation_icons\/rb2_large_gray.png\" alt=\"ResearchBlogging.org\" \/><\/a><\/span><strong>Summary<\/strong>: new research from ETH Zurich on using seismic signal to detect large landslide events<\/p>\n<p>Regular readers will be aware that in my view one of the most fascinating areas of landslide research at the moment is that of the <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/2011\/06\/23\/the-seismic-signature-of-a-large-landslide\/\">seismic signals that they generate<\/a>.\u00a0 Large, fast landslides, especially those formed from rock, are sufficiently energetic that they generate earthquake waves that can be recorded remotely.\u00a0 This provides an opportunity to detect large events as they occur and, potentially, to locate them.\u00a0 In addition, processing of the signal allows the speed of movement, and possibly other parameters to be determined.\u00a0 There are many applications of this, ranging from the academic (can we evaluate how many large landslides occur in an average year, and when and where do they happen?) to the practical (a well-developed system might give warning that a valley blocking landslide has occurred).<\/p>\n<p>Of course all of this is in principle &#8211; in other words we think that landslide-induced seismicity has this potential, but the reality of making it work is yet to be completed.\u00a0 And hence the need for research.<\/p>\n<p>Over at ETH Zurich, Jeff Moore and his colleagues have been working on this issue.\u00a0 Last week a paper (Dammeier <em>et al.<\/em> 2011) was posted online at the AGU journal &#8220;Journal of Gephysical Research &#8211; Earth Surface&#8221; that describes an investigation of these seismic signals, focusing on whether properties of a landslide, such as volume, can be derived from the seismic signals recorded remotely.\u00a0 To do this, 20 known rockslides from the Alps were compiled (including the 2004 <a href=\"http:\/\/historyofgeology.fieldofscience.com\/2010\/09\/18-september-2004-thurwieser-rock.html\">Thurweiser rock avalanche<\/a> shown below), and the data recorded in the regional seismic network analysed for each event.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3975\" style=\"width: 472px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-3975\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/2011\/11\/29\/on-seismic-signals-from-landslides-new-research\/11_11-thurweiser-1\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3975\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3975\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/files\/2011\/11\/11_11-Thurweiser-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"462\" height=\"645\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/files\/2011\/11\/11_11-Thurweiser-1.jpg 462w, https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/files\/2011\/11\/11_11-Thurweiser-1-214x300.jpg 214w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 462px) 100vw, 462px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-3975\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">http:\/\/historyofgeology.fieldofscience.com\/2010\/09\/18-september-2004-thurwieser-rock.html<\/p><\/div>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Crollo Cima Thurwieser\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/-7DUxISjcIU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The paper is interesting in a number of ways.\u00a0 First, it was clear that these events are indeed detectable and that they tend to have a characteristic spectrogram form that allows them to be differentiated from other events that generate seismic signals.\u00a0 The researchers also found that they could locate the events using the automated algorithms usually applied to earthquakes, with an average error of about 11 km.\u00a0 Of course, a circle of 11 km encloses a great deal of terrain, but nonetheless this at least gives a very encouraging starting point for finding the event.\u00a0 Hopefully with time this will be improved as better techniques are developed. \u00a0 Perhaps most usefully, the team found that simple metrics such as signal duration,  peak value                      of the ground velocity envelope and velocity envelope  area were correlated with landslide parameters such as volume, runout,  drop                      height, and potential energy.<\/p>\n<p>The research team then tested the resulting algorithm on three new landslide events, and succeeded in estimating key parameters to within an\u00a0 order of magnitude.\u00a0\u00a0 There is at least one other interesting aspect.\u00a0 This is that the study starts to indicate a maximum detection distance for events if different sizes &#8211; so, for example, a one million cubic metre event can be detected for a little over 100 km.\u00a0 This suggests that to do this properly a quite dense seismic network is needed.<\/p>\n<p>This study is a substantial step forward in this field, providing the quantitative reference algorithms that allow these analyses to be undertaken.\u00a0 It may well be that the relationships will need to be modified for other topographies, lithologies and land systems, so more work is needed in other mountain chains.\u00a0 However, the research validates the general approach, and as such is an important landmark.\u00a0 Hopefully it will stimulate more work in this important area.\u00a0 I hope that we&#8217;ll see more of this work by a variety of groups presented next week at the <a href=\"http:\/\/sites.agu.org\/fallmeeting\/\">AGU Fall meeting in San Francisco<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Reference<\/strong><br \/>\n<span class=\"Z3988\" title=\"ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&amp;rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Ajournal&amp;rft.jtitle=Journal+of+Geophysical+Research&amp;rft_id=info%3Adoi%2F10.1029%2F2011JF002037&amp;rfr_id=info%3Asid%2Fresearchblogging.org&amp;rft.atitle=Characterization+of+alpine+rockslides+using+statistical+analysis+of+seismic+signals&amp;rft.issn=0148-0227&amp;rft.date=2011&amp;rft.volume=116&amp;rft.issue=F4&amp;rft.spage=&amp;rft.epage=&amp;rft.artnum=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.agu.org%2Fpubs%2Fcrossref%2F2011%2F2011JF002037.shtml&amp;rft.au=Dammeier%2C+F.&amp;rft.au=Moore%2C+J.&amp;rft.au=Haslinger%2C+F.&amp;rft.au=Loew%2C+S.&amp;rfe_dat=bpr3.included=1;bpr3.tags=Geosciences%2Clandslide+rockfall+mass+movement\">Dammeier, F., Moore, J., Haslinger, F., &amp; Loew, S. (2011). Characterization of alpine rockslides using statistical analysis of seismic signals <span style=\"font-style: italic\">Journal of Geophysical Research, 116<\/span> (F4) DOI: <a rev=\"review\" href=\"http:\/\/dx.doi.org\/10.1029\/2011JF002037\">10.1029\/2011JF002037<\/a><\/span><\/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>new research from ETH Zurich on using seismic signal to detect large landslide events<!-- 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":3975,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[544,1],"tags":[469,959,588],"class_list":["post-3973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-review-of-a-paper","category-uncategorized","tag-featured","tag-landslide-report","tag-seismic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3973","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=3973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3973\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}