Collaborative Research: The 2015 Taan Fjord landslide tsunami: An interdisciplinary study of cause & effect

随着冰川的消退，压在谷壁上的冰也消失了。然后，这些岩壁就会变得不稳定，并可能在灾难性的山体滑坡中坍塌。在阿拉斯加，这种现象越来越普遍，山体滑坡有时会直接落入海洋，引发海啸。这就是2015年10月在坦湾发生的事情：美国几十年来最大的一次岩崩将1.5亿吨碎石冲进了峡湾的顶部，产生的巨浪沿着对岸150米高，冲刷了峡湾林木覆盖的两侧至少12公里。该项目的目标是收集这次塔安滑坡和海啸的观测数据，并向科学界和工程界提供基准数据集，以便他们更好地为未来的灾难做准备。该项目将结合卫星图像、现场观测和船基地图来限制滑坡和海啸的动力学，包括泥石流落水时的质量和速度、海啸波的产生及其运动模式，以及海底泥石流及其沉积。数据收集将于2016年夏天进行，并将于冬季交付给社区。

As glaciers retreat, the ice pressing up against their valley walls disappears. These rock walls then become unstable and can collapse in catastrophic landslides. In Alaska, where this phenomenon is increasingly common, landslides sometimes fall directly into the ocean and trigger a tsunami. This is what happened in October 2015 in the Taan Fiord: the largest rock avalanche in America in decades plunged 150 million tons of debris into the head of the fiord, producing a wave of water that ran 150m up the opposite bank and scoured the forested flanks of the fiord for at least 12km. The goal of the project is to collect observations of this Taan landslide and tsunami, and to deliver a benchmark dataset to the science and engineering communities so that they can better prepare for future disasters.The project will combine satellite images, field observations and ship-based mapping to constrain the dynamics of the landslide and tsunami, including the mass and velocity of debris when it struck the water, the magnitude of tsunami wave generation and its pattern of motion, and the submarine flow of debris and its deposition. Data collection will take place in the summer of 2016 and will be delivered to the community by the winter.