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Long-term evolution and early warning strategies for complex rockslides by real-time monitoring

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Abstract

The potential of long-term, real-time surface displacement monitoring by ground-based radar interferometry (GB-InSAR) to improve the understanding of mechanisms and set up objective early warning criteria for complex rockslides is explored. Monitoring data for a rockslide in the Central Italian Alps, collected since 1997 by ground-based and remote-sensing techniques, are examined. A unique 9-year continuous GB-InSAR monitoring activity supported an objective subdivision of the rockslide into “early warning domains” with homogeneous involved material, mechanisms and sensitivity to rainfall inputs. Distributed GB-InSAR data allowed setting up a “virtual monitoring network” by a posteriori selection of critical locations representative of early warning domains, for which we analysed relationships among rainfall descriptors and displacement rates. The potential of different early warning criteria, depending on the instability mechanisms dominating different domains, is tested. Results show that (a) rainfall intensity-duration-displacement rate relationships can be useful tools to predict displacements of “rainfall-sensitive” rockslide sectors, where clear trigger-response signals occur, but are unsuitable in rockslide domains affected by the long-term progressive failure of the rock slope and (b) effective early warning strategies for collapse scenarios (entire rockslide, specific domains) can be enforced by modelling real-time, high-frequency GB-InSAR data according to the accelerated creep theory.

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Acknowledgements

We thank ARPA Lombardia for the collaboration and Davide Leva (Ellegi s.r.l.) for the continuous development of the LisaLab GBInSAR software and equipment and the help in data analysis. We are grateful to Regione Lombardia for providing the satellite-based radar interferometry data (TRE—Telerilevamento Europa srl). The research was partly supported by the EU FP7 project SAFELAND (GA 226479) and partly by the Italian Ministry of Research—PRIN 2010-11 program prot. 2010E89BPY_007 project. The data presented and discussed in this paper can be requested directly to the authors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Milano-Bicocca, Building U4, room 2016, Piazza delle Scienza, 4, I-20126, Milan, Italy

    G. B. Crosta, F. Agliardi & S. Alberti

  2. Ellegi s.r.l., Corso Magenta, 12, I-20123, Milan, Italy

    C. Rivolta

  3. ARPA Lombardia, Settore Suolo, Risorse Idriche e Meteoclimatologia, Viale Francesco Restelli, 3/1, I-20124, Milan, Italy

    L. Dei Cas

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  1. G. B. Crosta
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  2. F. Agliardi
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Correspondence to G. B. Crosta.

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Crosta, G.B., Agliardi, F., Rivolta, C. et al. Long-term evolution and early warning strategies for complex rockslides by real-time monitoring. Landslides 14, 1615–1632 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10346-017-0817-8

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