Failures of Moraines and a Debris Flow due to Intense Rainstorm in July 1995 in the Shirouma-Daisekkei Valley, the northern Japanese Alps

Abstract

A number of collapses, landslides, and debris flows occurred in the Himekawa river basin, in the northeastern part of the Japanese Alps, caused by an intense rainstorm (814 mm/2 days) on 11 and 12 July 1995 after the long periods of rainfall. A debris flow induced by failures of late glacial moraines at thresholds of two cirques traveled down into the Shirouma-daisekkei valley, a tributary of the Himekawa river in the midst of the rainstorm. The debris flow deposits (2, 200 m in length, 80 m100 m in width, 2.5×104 m3 in volume), covered the large snowpatch remaining on the valley bottom, and a longitudinal trench was formed at the center of the snow patch by debris flow. The moraines had been saturated with a large quantity of precipitation during the rainy season and snow meltwater in early summer, followed by the large volume of water of the rainstorm. Consequently, a voluminous discharge concentrated on the cirque floors, and rushed out to the moraines of the cirques, causing their collpse. The frequency of such an intense rainstorm in the area is considered to be once in two hundred years, therefore, the volume of moraine failures induced by intense rainstorms can be estimated to be more than 1×106 m3 during the Post Glacial period. This kind of moraine failure plays an important role in the degrading processes of Pleistocene glacial landforms located in the upstream of the glaciated valleys in Japan, because of its rainy and snowy climatic characteristics.