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Recent debris flows in the Portainé catchment (Eastern Pyrenees, Spain): analysis of monitoring and field data focussing on the 2015 event

Landslides volume 14, pages 1161–1170 (2017)Cite this article

Abstract

During the night of the 21 August 2015, a debris flow took place in one of the presently most active ravines of the Pyrenees, the Portainé torrent (Eastern Pyrenees, Spain), and caused considerable damage to the road. Detailed information was gathered from the debris flow monitoring system recently installed in the torrent and field surveys. The monitoring system measures ground vibration at geophones and flow height at an ultrasonic sensor. Meteorological data showed that the debris flow was triggered by a convective rainstorm with a total rainfall amount of 29 mm. All these data provide information on the debris flow occurrence and dynamics. The analysis of the data showed that the debris flow had three different surges and mobilised a total volume of about 2130 m3. The front velocity in the monitoring reach was somewhat small (about 2 m/s) and the peak flow discharge comparatively low (about 13 m3/s). In addition, the debris flow was back-analysed by a numerical model calibrated by the observed event. The results of the simulation showed that a Voellmy fluid rheological model can represent considerably well the recorded and observed measurements, and the best-fit values were μ = 0.28 and C = 8 m0.5/s.

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Acknowledgements

This research was funded by different research projects of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (DEBRISTART CGL2011-23300, CHARMA CGL2013-40828-R and SMuCPhy BIA2015-67500-R) and by the PyrMove thematic research network (AGAUR 2014CTP00051). We also thank the Catalan Meteorological Service (www.meteocat.es) for the data supply and Carles Fañanás for the valuable information on the recent and historic events.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Geotechnical Engineering and Geosciences, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, BarcelonaTECH, Jordi Girona 1–3 (D2), 08034, Barcelona, Spain

    Rosa M. Palau, Marcel Hürlimann, José Moya & Càrol Puig-Polo

  2. Department of Geotechnical Engineering, College of Civil Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, 200092, China

    Rosa M. Palau

  3. Department of Geotechnical and Geological Hazard Prevention, Cartographic and Geological Institute of Catalonia, Parc de Montjuïc S/N, 08038, Barcelona, Spain

    Jordi Pinyol

  4. RISKNAT Research Group, GEOMODELS Research Institute, Departament de Dinàmica de la Terra i de l’Oceà, Facultat de Ciències de la Terra, Universitat de Barcelona, Martí i Franqués s/n, 08028, Barcelona, Spain

    Ane Victoriano

  5. Departamento de Sistemas y Recursos Naturales, Escuela Técnica Superior de Montes, Forestal y del Medio Natural, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Mar Génova

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  1. Rosa M. Palau
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  2. Marcel Hürlimann
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  4. José Moya
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  5. Ane Victoriano
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  6. Mar Génova
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Correspondence to Marcel Hürlimann.

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Palau, R.M., Hürlimann, M., Pinyol, J. et al. Recent debris flows in the Portainé catchment (Eastern Pyrenees, Spain): analysis of monitoring and field data focussing on the 2015 event. Landslides 14, 1161–1170 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10346-017-0832-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10346-017-0832-9

Keywords

  • Debris flows
  • Monitoring
  • Rainfall
  • Portainé catchment
  • Pyrenees