Numerical modeling of the Mount Steller landslide flow history and of the generated long period seismic waves

• Main Authors: Moretti, L, Mangeney, A, Capdeville, Y, Stutzmann, E, Huggel, C, Schneider, D, Bouchut, F
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: American Geophysical Union 2012
• Subjects: Institute of Geography; 910 Geography & travel; glacier; Alaska
• Online Access: https://www.zora.uzh.ch/id/eprint/68355/; https://www.zora.uzh.ch/id/eprint/68355/1/2012_HuggelC_moretti_mt_steller_landslide_modeling_grl12_Kopie_.pdf; https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-68355; https://doi.org/10.1029/2012GL052511

The rock-ice avalanche that occurred in 2005 on Mount Steller, Alaska and the resulting long period seismic waves have been simulated for different avalanche scenarios (i.e., flow histories), with and without erosion processes taken into account. This 40–60 Mm3 avalanche traveled about 10 km down the slope, mainly on top of a glacier, eroding a significant amount of ice. It was recorded by 7 broadband seismic stations. The simulations were compared with the recorded long period seismic signal and with the inverted flow history. The results show that, when erosion processes are taken into account, the simulations reproduce the observed signal at all the stations over a wide range of azi- muths and source-station distances (37–623 km). This comparison makes it possible to constrain the rheological parameters involved which should help constrain the volume of eroded material. Because landslides are continuously recorded by seismic networks, this method could signifi- cantly broaden quantitative insights into natural flow dynamics. Citation: Moretti, L., A. Mangeney, Y. Capdeville, E. Stutzmann, C. Huggel, D. Schneider, and F. Bouchut (2012), Numerical modeling of the Mount Steller landslide flow history and of the generated long period seismic waves.