Fatal landslides in Europe

Landslides are a major hazard causing human and large economic losses worldwide. However, the quantification of fatalities and casualties is highly underestimated and incomplete, thus, the estimation of landslide risk is rather ambitious. Hence, a spatio-temporal distribution of deadly landslides is presented for 27 European countries over the last 20  years (1995–2014). Catastrophic landslides are widely distributed throughout Europe, however, with a great concentration in mountainous areas. In the studied period, a total of 1370 deaths and 784 injuries were reported resulting from 476 landslides. Turkey showed the highest fatalities with 335. An increasing trend of fatal landslides is observed, with a pronounced number of fatalities in the latest period from 2008 to 2014. The latter are mostly triggered by natural extreme events such as storms (i.e., heavy rainfall), earthquakes, and floods and only minor by human activities, such as mining and excavation works. Average economic loss per year in Europe is approximately 4.7 billion Euros. This study serves as baseline information for further risk mapping by integrating deadly landslide locations, local land use data, and will therefore help countries to protect human lives and property.     

PT Paths from modal proportions: application to the Koralm Complex,Eastern Alps

Thermodynamic pseudosections portray those parts of a petrogenetic grid that are relevant to a given bulk composition and the reactions appearing on them can therefore be used directly to infer the PT path that the rock followed. However, for many ‘normal’ bulk compositions the use of pseudosections is hampered by the fact that they display only few large fields of high thermodynamic variance in the PT range of interest. Here it is discussed how modal information on reaction progress within these fields can be used to determine PT path information for thermodynamically high variant metamorphic assemblages. We use this information on reaction progress to contour pseudosections for modal proportions of minerals using the software package THERMOCALC. The approach is applied to di- tri- and quadrivariant assemblages from the Koralm complex in the eastern Alps. A PT path for these rocks is derived from modal considerations and compared with interpretations of mineral composition contours on the same pseudosection and with conventional thermobarometry. It is shown that at least part of the complex must have cooled initially near isobarically from prevalent peak conditions around 700°C and 14 kbar before the rocks commenced a Barroviantype decompression path.     

New calibrating functions for short-period body waves of Friuli earthquakes

n¶rt; auau uu ¶rt; mnu¶rt; n, n, g, Sg, m anmam anauu ¶rt; numa amu 2.6° ¶rt; 4.7° m aa amu uu (mau). aa, m m auum _Sg(D) mam mua ¶rt; m n¶rt;u aum¶rt; uma a uu mu.     

Paleomagnetism in Greece: Indications for relative block movement

There is a difference of 120° between the strike of the Pindos mountain chain and that of the Argolis peninsula. Both consist of rocks of the same age (Triassic Jurassic).Samples were collected to see if paleomagnetic data also exhibited this difference in angle. 23 samples from two sites and four lava strata of the Pindos resulted in normal and reversed directions with a mean direction D = 334°, I = 22° with α_95° = 9°, and 24 samples from four sites of the Argolis peninsula in a mean direction of D = 82°, I = 19° with α_95° = 17°. This is a declination difference of D = 108°. Therefore, a relative rotational block movement with an angle of about 110° could be assumed. The result depends to a great extent on the dip correction of the lava flows.     

Minerals of the viridine hornfels from Darmstadt,Germany

Viridine containing the highest amounts of Mn₂O₃ detected thus far (up to 20.5 mol % “Mn₂SiO₅”) coexists in a metasedimentary hornfels with spessartine, Mn-phlogopite (mangan-ophyllite), Mn-phengite (alurgite), hematite, quartz and probably some primary braunite. In layers poorer in viridine spessartine is absent but piemontite appears as an additional phase. Microprobe analyses of all these phases are presented which indicate very strong fractionation of Mg and Mn in coexisting phlogopite and garnet, and of Fe and Mn in coexisting hematite and braunite. Sericitic aggregates consisting of phengitic muscovite and braunite are interpreted as retrograde alteration products of viridine, but might partly be pinitic alterations of a former Mg-rich cordierite. Due to the occurrence of the assemblage spessartine-viridine-quartz Mn-cordierite cannot have been a stable phase prior to retrograde alterations. In general the stability field of viridine is extended towards higher temperatures as compared to that of pure andalusite, Al₂SiO₅. Due to the coexistence of phlogopite and muscovite (phengite) the temperature of contact metamorphism cannot have exceeded some 550°–650° C depending on the prevailing water pressure.     

Thermochemistry of phases in the system MgGa2O4-Mg2GeO4

The enthalpies of solution in molten 2PbO · B₂O₃ of phases synthesized at one atmosphere in the system MgGa₂O₄-Mg₂GeO₄ have been measured. A spinel solid solution, which is stable at 1400 °C from the MgGa₂O₄ end-member to 27 mole percent Mg₂GeO₄, shows endothermic heats of mixing of up to 10 kJ/mole at the solubility limit. The spinelloid phase, Mg₃Ga₂GeO₈, is energetically less stable than a mixture of terminal spinel solid solutions (0.73 MgGa₂O₄·0.27 Mg₂GeO₄(sp)+Mg₂GeO₄(sp)), by 3.63±3.64 kJ/mole. This indicates that the spinelloid is a high-entropy phase.The volume of the spinel solid solution, MgGa₂O₄-Mg₂GeO₄, shows a positive deviation from Vegard's Law. Modeling of the cation distribution in the solid solution indicates that this V is due to a change in the spinel type from inverse towards normal as the Mg₂GeO₄ content increases.