Mapping susceptibility of rainfall-triggered shallow landslides using a probabilistic approach

To prepare a landslide susceptibility map is essential to identify hazardous regions, construct appropriate mitigation facilities, and plan emergency measures for a region prone to landslides triggered by rainfall. The conventional mapping methods require much information about past landslides records and contributing terrace and rainfall. They also rely heavily on the quantity and quality of accessible information and subjectively of the map builder. This paper contributes to a systematic and quantitative assessment of mapping landslide hazards over a region. Geographical Information System is implemented to retrieve relevant parameters from data layers, including the spatial distribution of transient fluid pressures, which is estimated using the TRIGRS program. The factor of safety of each pixel in the study region is calculated analytically. Monte Carlo simulation of random variables is conducted to process the estimation of fluid pressure and factor of safety for multiple times. The failure probability of each pixel is thus estimated. These procedures of mapping landslide potential are demonstrated in a case history. The analysis results reveal a positive correlation between landslide probability and accumulated rainfall. This approach gives simulation results compared to field records. The location and size of actual landslide are well predicted. An explanation for some of the inconsistencies is also provided to emphasize the importance of site information on the accuracy of mapping results.     

Quantitative sinkhole hazard assessment. A case study from the Ebro Valley evaporite alluvial karst (NE Spain)

Quantitative sinkhole hazard assessments in karst areas allow calculation of the potential sinkhole risk and the performance of cost-benefit analyses. These estimations are of practical interest for planning, engineering, and insurance purposes. The sinkhole hazard assessments should include two components: the probability of occurrence of sinkholes (sinkholes/km² year) and the severity of the sinkholes, which mainly refers to the subsidence mechanisms (progressive passive bending or catastrophic collapse) and the size of the sinkholes at the time of formation; a critical engineering design parameter. This requires the compilation of an exhaustive database on recent sinkholes, including information on the: (1) location, (2) chronology (precise date or age range), (3) size, and (4) subsidence mechanisms and rate. This work presents a hazard assessment from an alluvial evaporite karst area (0.81 km²) located in the periphery of the city of Zaragoza (Ebro River valley, NE Spain). Five sinkholes and four locations with features attributable to karstic subsidence where identified in an initial investigation phase providing a preliminary probability of occurrence of 0.14 sinkholes/km² year (11.34% in annual probability). A trenching program conducted in a subsequent investigation phase allowed us to rule out the four probable sinkholes, reducing the probability of occurrence to 0.079 sinkholes/km² year (6.4% in annual probability). The information on the severity indicates that collapse sinkholes 10–15 m in diameter may occur in the area. A detailed study of the deposits and deformational structures exposed by trenching in one of the sinkholes allowed us to infer a modern collapse sinkhole approximately 12 m in diameter and with a vertical throw of 8 m. This collapse structure is superimposed on a subsidence sinkhole around 80 m across that records at least 1.7 m of synsedimentary subsidence. Trenching, in combination with dating techniques, is proposed as a useful methodology to elucidate the origin of depressions with uncertain diagnosis and to gather practical information with predictive utility about particular sinkholes in alluvial karst settings: precise location, subsidence mechanisms and magnitude, and timing and rate of the subsidence episodes.     

Transformation of Lambert Conic Conformal Coordinates from a Global Datum to a Local Datum

This paper treats the problem of how to transform from global datum, for example, from the International Terrestrial Reference System (ITRS), to a local datum, for example, regional or national, for the practical case of the Lambert projection of the sphere or the ellipsoid-of-revolution to the cone. We design the two projection constants n(ϕ₁, ϕ₂) and m(ϕ₁) for the Universal Lambert Conic projection of the ellipsoid-of-revolution. The task to transform from a global datum with respect to the ellipsoid-of-revolution E_A,B² to local datum with respect to the alternative ellipsoid-of-revolution E_a,b², without local ellipsoidal height, is solved by an extended numerical example. Ideas in this paper could be of interest to those working with maps and coordinates transformation from global geodetic datum to local geodetic datum and vice versa, under the Universal Lambert Conic projection, and applicable to precise positioning and navigation, boundary demarcation and determination in the marine environment.     

A probability distribution for depth-limited extreme wave heights in a sea state

A model for the depth-limited distribution of the highest wave in a sea state is presented. The distribution for the extreme wave height is based on a probability density function (pdf) for depth-limited wave height distribution for individual waves [Méndez, F.J., Losada, I.J., Medina, R. 2004. Transformation model of wave height distribution. Coastal Eng, Vol. 50, 97:115.] and considers the correlation between consecutive waves. The model is validated using field data showing a good representation of the extreme wave heights in the surf zone. Some important statistical wave heights are parameterized obtaining useful expressions that can be used in further calculations.     

Distribution of nonlinear wave crests

The distribution of nonlinear wave crests is examined on the basis of a theoretical probability density previously given elsewhere (J. Eng. Mech. 120 (1994) 1009). Certain errors contained in the original theoretical density are corrected, and the corresponding exceedance distribution is derived. The resulting theoretical forms of the probability density and exceedance distribution are then slightly simplified and compared with nonlinear wave data gathered under hurricane conditions. The results indicate that the proposed theoretical forms describe the observed distributions of large wave crests better than the Rayleigh law. However, the quantitative accuracy of the predictions is somewhat poor, as is typical of approximate theories based on Gram–Charlier-type expansions.     

Statistics of nonlinear wave crests and groups

Groups of large nonlinear waves with sharper higher crests can pose hazards to ships, induce harbor resonance and cause wave-overtopping of fixed and floating structures. Past interest in wave groups has mostly been focused on the statistics and modeling of linear wave groups. Studies on nonlinear wave groups are surprisingly few, and address deep water waves only. Here, statistics of nonlinear wave crests and wave-crest groups in deep and transitional water depths are considered, using an appropriate second-order representation for crest heights and the continuous wave-envelope approach. In particular, theoretical expressions describing the statistics of nonlinear wave crests and their groups are posed in the form of a simple second-order transformation of well-known results on linear waves. Predictions from the transformation so posed compare well with nonlinear wave data gathered in the North Sea, and demonstrate that nonlinearities do affect the statistics of large wave crests and their groups significantly.     

Statistics of wave forces on large horizontal cylinders

To the first order in a Stokes expansion, the pressure force exerted by a sea state on a large horizontal cylinder represents a stationary random Gaussian process. A relationship is obtained between the spectrum of this process and the wave spectrum. As a consequence, the basic statistical properties of the height and period of the individual waves of the force-process are also obtained. It is proven that these statistical properties agree very well with the data from a small scale field experiment.     

海岸带专题地图编绘相关问题

海岸带是影响人类活动的重要地带，海岸带专题地图能够详细表示出海岸带的特性。随着海洋经济的发展，海岸图的需求日益增加。从地图的数学要素出发，提出目前海岸图绘制存在的问题，并从地图学、海洋学、遥感地学的角度，对地图投影的选择、坐标系转换、比例尺对海岸图编绘的影响及控制点的确定等问题进行了综合分析。     

高斯投影公式的机助推导

随着GPS应用的普及,高斯投影在测量中出现的机会越来越多。许多文献上都给出了推导过程,这个推导过程的运算量是非常大的,而且计算精度难于提高。经过研究,一种易于编程的递推公式被发现,虽然这个公式在计算量上没有减少,但是可以较好地解决精度问题。     

丽江市地质灾害易发性遥感影像判译

丽江市地质灾害多发,在滇西北旅游城市中较典型。应用遥感技术对丽江市地质灾害易发性的遥感研究,可突破传统方法,发挥宏观、综合、直观、快速特点,取得较好效果。