Snow avalanches in relation to tourism and transportation activities in the Făgăraş Mountains, Romanian Carpathians

Abstract

In mountainous regions, avalanches can seriously damage tourist infrastructure, roads, and forests and lead to loss of human life. The analyses were performed in the Făgăraş Mountains, Southern Carpathians-Romania. This study addresses the following questions: How does risk differ over time depending on the snow avalanche activity? (ii) How reliable are complementary, statistical, and dendrogeomorphological approaches for analysing the avalanche activity? Our analysis was based on extensive documentation, using old photographs, maps, papers and database statistics. We also utilized dendrogeomorphological data, satellite images and event simulations using the RAMMS avalanche module. The study data was collected between 1880 and 2020, in three different periods, each with socioeconomic peculiarities: the Romanian Kingdom Period, communist period, and post-communist period. In the first period, the tourist infrastructure was modest and the avalanche hazard was not recognized. Only three avalanche accidents were recorded. In the communist period, 25 avalanche accidents were recorded. In the postcommunist period, 75 avalanche accidents were recorded. Avalanche activity strongly interfered with the emergence of new elements of tourist infrastructure, such as huts, alpine refuges, and the Transfăgărăşan highway. Our results show that despite protection measures, avalanche risk awareness information, use of the European risk scale, and the issuing of danger bulletins, especially in the last 20 years, the risk has remained high due to increased exposure and vulnerability of tourist infrastructure and tourists.