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Development of seismic signal-based snow-avalanche spectral utility

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Abstract

Snow avalanche is one of the life-claiming disasters in the snow-covered mountain regions of the world. It is an event which occurs when a top layer of snow loses its strength by the breakage of bonds with the bottom layers. This rupture results in a sudden release of elastic energy, which causes the emission of acoustic signals. Seismic geophones deployed near the avalanche-prone regions automatically detect these acoustic signals whose response represents the magnitude of triggered avalanches. The data on avalanche activity is vital for avalanche forecasting in order to alert people of certain regions in advance to reduce harmful effects of avalanches. To be helpful in avalanche forecasting, we have developed a utility with the help of MATLAB GUIDE resource to investigate snow avalanche data recorded on different days. The utility includes various segments for avalanche data processing, using which the seismic activity can be precisely classified. By analyzing various spectral parameters of the avalanche activity, our module could provide accurate information on the impact of triggered avalanches. Eventually, we also compared avalanche data with other background activities like earthquake signals, explosion noise and aeroplane noise in order to minimize the possibility of false-alarming.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Dr J C Kapil, Scientist – E at the Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment (SASE) – Chandigarh of the Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO), for their guidance and providing the vital real-time seismic data.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, National Institute of Technology Kurukshetra, Kurukshetra, 136 119, India

    S S S D Koushik & Ashavani Kumar

  2. DRDO-Defence Geoinformatics Research Establishment (DGRE), Chandigarh, 160 017, India

    J C Kapil

Authors
  1. S S S D Koushik
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  2. Ashavani Kumar
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  3. J C Kapil
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Contributions

S S S D Koushik: Conceptualization, modelling, development, simulation, result analysis, and preparation of the draft of the manuscript. Ashavani Kumar: Guidance, review and valuable supervision. J C Kapil: Guidance, conceptualization, modelling, result analysis, review and valuable supervision.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ashavani Kumar.

Additional information

Communicated by Somnath Dasgupta

Corresponding editor: Somnath Dasgupta

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Koushik, S.S.S.D., Kumar, A. & Kapil, J.C. Development of seismic signal-based snow-avalanche spectral utility. J Earth Syst Sci 133, 25 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-023-02236-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-023-02236-5

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