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Kayaking Field Trip

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Defenses
Due by 5 pm today

Plan for Today

Define Mass Wasting Understand why slopes dont slide/fall/flow Types of mass wasting Causes of mass wasting

Mass Wasting
Definition: Erosion without (much, if any) transporting agent i.e., (wind/water/ice)

Why dont slopes fail

What keeps the top of Sehome Hill up there, instead of down here?
Rock Integrity Friction

Important types of mass wasting

Slide: Rock stays coherent, more or less Fall: Rocks fall Flow: Rocks behave like a fluid

Slump (a type of slide)

Indicators:
Scarp Hummocky terrain on and below (earthflow)

Slump
Earth moves on shallow, curved fault
scarp

Debris Flow
Also called mudflow, mudslide Soil & regolith get saturated with water and flow like liquid
cement to soup consistency moderate to very fast movement

Debris Flow

 Rock moves because theres nothing holding it back! Generally requires a pre-existing low-friction surface...

Rockslide

Rockslide
like a clay layer, once its wet...

Earthquake Lake, MT
28 deaths in 1959, triggered by earthquake

Earthflow
basically a very viscous (thick) debris flow slow-moving
faster in wetter weather

Earthflow

 very slow result of freezing and thawing

Creep

Creep

Creep

from D. Schwert, NDSU

Factors in mass wasting

steepness wetness
decreases friction by increasing pore pressure

soil weight
water increases soil weight

vegetation
deep roots anchor soil

Triggers for rapid Mass Wasting

Rain Oversteepening
cutting at foot of slope piling on head of slope

Deforesting / Devegetating Earthquakes

a-debris flow b-rock fall c-earthflow d-slump

a-debris flow b-rock fall c-earthflow d-slump

a-debris flow b-rock fall c-earthflow d-slump

a-debris flow b-rock fall c-earthflow d-slump

Check out the mass wasting links

Links to Washington landslide stories
Bainbridge Island story in the Atlantic Monthly Kelso and the mobile subdivision

Mass Wasting WarmUp: your dream house

I would avoid buying a house on a cliff which obviously is in the process of being eroded by the water beneath it. This happens in California all the time...then people complain when their million dollar house falls into the ocean! Anybody can see the bloody hill is being washed away! To ensure that I wouldn't buy property with a slope stability problem I would look for an area that had trees to solidify the ground with roots, and some sort of solid material underneath the soil like granite, instead of material that could slide like clay.

Mass Wasting WarmUp: your dream house

I would look at the ground to try and find evidence of a geologically recent landslide.