Development of new tools and techniques for the analysis and risk management of landslides and related geohazards

山体滑坡和相关的自然和人为地质灾害(地质灾害)，包括尾矿坝决口，可远距离传播，因此对世界各地的人、财产和环境构成重大风险。这项研究计划的长期目标是通过开发一套工具和技术来提高工程师和地球科学家回答以下问题的能力，从而减少这些事件造成的损失： 发生给定规模的山体滑坡或相关地质灾害的概率是多少？ 如果它发生了，它到达某个感兴趣的地点(例如社区)的概率是多少？ 如果它到达那个位置，它造成一定程度损害的可能性有多大？ 如果由此产生的风险是不可接受的，通过各种缓解方案可以减少多少风险？ 为了实现这一长期目标，这项研究计划在未来五年的目标是改进现有工具，并开发新的工具，用于预测以下关键地质灾害的运动：泥石流、泥石流洪水、尾矿坝决口、海岸线侵蚀和滑坡引发的波浪。所有这些地质灾害都提出了独特的建模挑战，这将是我们工作的重点。例如，我们将研究如何预测泥石流可能在哪里跳出河道并突然改变方向，这一特征使其成为可靠评估和有效缓解的具有挑战性的地质灾害。我们还将把重点放在为工程师和地球科学家提供更好的指导工作，以便在他们的计算机模拟中使用什么输入参数值。 我们的研究方法将基于以下四个要素：1)使用最先进的方法收集和绘制过去地质灾害事件的数据，包括观察新水电站蓄水造成的侵蚀和山体滑坡的独特机会；2)对我们收集的数据进行统计分析，以寻找可用于预测未来事件可能移动的趋势；3)开发和校准可用于预测未来事件可能移动的方向、距离和速度的计算机模型；以及4)与其他研究人员合作，进行实验室实验，以研究影响这些地质灾害行为的基本过程。通过这项工作，该专业的学生将获得这些地质灾害的专业知识，并发展实践中高度需要的专业技能，他们将继续为我们减少地质灾害损失的长期目标做出贡献。

Landslides and related natural and man-made geological hazards (geohazards), including breaches of mine tailings dams, can travel long distances and therefore pose a significant risk around the world to people, property and the environment. The long-term goal of this research program is to reduce the losses caused by these events by developing a suite of tools and techniques that improve the ability of engineers and geoscientists to answer the following questions: What is the probability that a landslide or related geohazard of a given size will occur? If it occurs, what is the probability it will reach a certain location of interest (e.g. a community)? If it reaches that location, what is the probability it will cause a certain degree of damage? If the resulting risk is unacceptable, how much can it be reduced with various mitigation options? To work toward this long-term goal, the objectives of this research program over the next five years are to improve existing tools and develop new tools that can be used to forecast the motion of the following key geohazards: debris flows, debris floods, tailings dam breaches, shoreline erosion and landslide-generated waves. All of these geohazards present unique modelling challenges that will be a focus of our work. For example, we will be studying ways to predict where debris flows may jump out of their channels and suddenly change direction, a characteristic that makes them a challenging geohazard to reliably assess and effectively mitigate. We will also focus on work that will provide better guidance to engineers and geoscientists on what input parameter values to use in their computer simulations. Our research method will be based on the following four elements: 1) field data collection and mapping of past geohazard events using state-of-the-art methods, including a unique opportunity to observe erosion and landslides caused by the filling of a new hydroelectric reservoir, 2) statistical analysis of the data we collect to look for trends that can be used to predict how far future events may travel, 3) development and calibration of computer models that can be used to predict what direction, how far and how fast future events may travel, and 4) laboratory experiments, in collaboration with other researchers, to study underlying fundamental processes that influence the behaviour of these geohazards. Through the course of this work, students in this program will gain expert knowledge of these geohazards and develop specialized skills that are in high demand in practice, where they will continue to contribute to our long-term goal of geohazard loss reduction.