Landslide in Icy Bay

60.16765 -141.17974Coordinates: 60 ° 10 ′ 4 " N , 141 ° 10 ′ 47" W.

Overview of the landslide on the Tyndall Glacier. The man in the picture is about 190 m above the water level and you can still see damage from the tsunami in the foreground.

The landslide in Icy Bay on October 17, 2015 was one of the most violent landslides in US history. Geologists found the first signs of a landslide after seismic activity. From their recordings, a landslide could be calculated that lasted 60 seconds and set about 200 million tons of rock in motion. Chris Larsen then confirmed the landslide near the Tyndall Glacier in Taan Fjord , a tributary of Icy Bay , in spring 2016 . The tsunami wave that reached the opposite slope was 193 m high. The event was probably triggered by high temperatures and prolonged rainfall. People were not harmed by the landslide because the area is very sparsely populated.

Recent studies have shown that an earthquake with a strength of 4.1 M _W occurred two minutes before the landslide about 500 km from Tyndall Glacier . However, it was also found that the masses were already in motion, because in autumn 2015 about ten percent higher rain volumes were measured in the region than usual. Therefore, the earthquake could only have been the initial trigger.

For comparison: during the landslide at Lituya Bay in 1958 , less volume of rock fell into the sea, but from a greater height, and it was demonstrated that the wave sloshing up a mountain slope was several times higher.

Commons

Commons : Landslide in the Icy Bay - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

↑ Jan Dönges: Alaska: landslide triggers giant tsunami. Last October there was a landslide for the history books: Around 200 million tons of rock slipped into the water of a fjord - probably more than ever recorded. In: Spectrum of Science. April 12, 2016, accessed April 13, 2016 .
↑ ^a ^b Bretwood Higman, Dan H. Shugar, Colin P. Stark, Göran Ekström, Michele N. Koppes, Patrick Lynett, Anja Dufresne, Peter J. Haeussler, Marten Geertsema, Sean Gulick, Andrew Mattox, Jeremy G. Venditti, Maureen AL Walton, Naoma McCall, Erin Mckittrick, Breanyn MacInnes, Eric L. Bilderback, Hui Tang, Michael J. Willis, Bruce Richmond, Robert S. Reece, Chris Larsen, Bjorn Olson, James Capra, Aykut Ayca, Colin Bloom, Haley Williams , Doug Bonno, Robert Weiss, Adam Keen, Vassilios Skanavis & Michael Loso: The 2015 landslide and tsunami in Taan Fiord, Alaska . In: Scientific Report . tape 8 , no. 12993 , 2018, doi : 10.1038 / s41598-018-30475-w .
↑ Daniel Lingenhöhl: What triggered a huge tsunami in 2015. A few years ago there was a huge tsunami in a fjord in Alaska. The waves hit over 100 meters. It is now clear what caused the floods. Retrieved June 21, 2020 .

[1] Jan Dönges: Alaska: landslide triggers giant tsunami. Last October there was a landslide for the history books: Around 200 million tons of rock slipped into the water of a fjord - probably more than ever recorded. In: Spectrum of Science. April 12, 2016, accessed April 13, 2016 .

[Bretwood17-2] Bretwood Higman, Dan H. Shugar, Colin P. Stark, Göran Ekström, Michele N. Koppes, Patrick Lynett, Anja Dufresne, Peter J. Haeussler, Marten Geertsema, Sean Gulick, Andrew Mattox, Jeremy G. Venditti, Maureen AL Walton, Naoma McCall, Erin Mckittrick, Breanyn MacInnes, Eric L. Bilderback, Hui Tang, Michael J. Willis, Bruce Richmond, Robert S. Reece, Chris Larsen, Bjorn Olson, James Capra, Aykut Ayca, Colin Bloom, Haley Williams , Doug Bonno, Robert Weiss, Adam Keen, Vassilios Skanavis & Michael Loso: The 2015 landslide and tsunami in Taan Fiord, Alaska . In: Scientific Report . tape 8 , no. 12993 , 2018, doi : 10.1038 / s41598-018-30475-w .

[3] Daniel Lingenhöhl: What triggered a huge tsunami in 2015. A few years ago there was a huge tsunami in a fjord in Alaska. The waves hit over 100 meters. It is now clear what caused the floods. Retrieved June 21, 2020 .