Abstract
Glacial avalanche hazard poses threat to human lives and damage settlements / infrastructures in alpine glaciers mountainous regions. A gigantic ice plus rock avalanche destroyed Gyari military camp in Siachen sector on April 2012 and buried 139 personals. The study focuses on geospatial analysis and simulation of Shishper glacial avalanche of Hunza basin. To simulate the potential glacial avalanche hazard to Hassan Abad settlements, an empirical process based Glacier Avalanche Model; Rapid Access Mass Movement Simulation (RAMMS) is utilized. The model encompasses avalanche release area and height for the execution of simulation. The model output of Shishper glacial avalanche resulted; a max pressure of 450 Kpa, max velocity of 40 m/s, and the max flow height of 80m, while the resulted surge extent output was 2500m. The potential hazardous Shishper glacial avalanche remains a continuous hazard to Hassan Abad of Hunza valley including Karakoram Highway and Frontier Works Organization (FWO) camp. The study has resulted in identifying the Upper Indus Bain (UIB) being more prone to glacial avalanche hazards because of host factors in general and the anthropogenic factor in particular.
Highlights
The alpine glaciers of the sub-continent region are a renewable natural freshwater storehouse that benefits millions of people downstream
The Remote Sensing techniques were used in the study for determination of glacial hazard coupled with ArcGIS software for geospatial analysis in Hunza basin
The Rapid Access Mass Movement Simulation (RAMMS) model is an effective tool for simulation and modeling of glacier avalanche hazard
Summary
The alpine glaciers of the sub-continent region are a renewable natural freshwater storehouse that benefits millions of people downstream. Owing to global warming acceleration, the glaciers of the mid-latitude region are retreating since the second half of the 20th century. The retreating glacier phenomenon has accounted for the generation of many disastrous avalanches. It is likely that glacier-connected lakes may have accelerated the glacial mass movement via thermal energy transmission and contributed to the significant area loss in their connected glaciers. The significant glacial retreats led to disconnections from their pro-glacial lakes, which appeared to destabilize the glaciers in the Himalaya. Continuous formation of the glacial lakes connected with debris-covered glaciers, need additional attention due to their growing potential outflows [2]. The ice avalanches are the indicators of the regular depletion phenomenon of the steep glaciers in higher elevation ranges having high relief energy.
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