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Observing the impacts of 1950s great Assam earthquake in the tectono-geomorphological deformations at the Young Meghna Estuarine Floodplain of Bangladesh: evidence from Noakhali Coastal Region

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Abstract

The 1950s great Assam earthquake (GAE) is considered the sixth largest earthquake of the twentieth century in South Asia caused by a collision of two continental plates. This earthquake affected the whole eastern half of the Indian subcontinent and significant tectono-geomorphological deformations were observed at the final course of the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna (GBM) river processes. This is especially the case in the Young Meghna Estuarine Floodplain (YMEF) areas, which have rarely been investigated and documented. Thus, the present study examined the massive geomorphic changes and regarded the configuration changes of the YMEF area immediately after the event, along with its recent aspects. Several direct field surveys together with Focus Group Discussion (FGD), and Key Person Interview (KPI) were conducted within the study area from September 2018 to December 2019. The findings of these research initiatives were augmented by analyzing historical toposheets (1942 and 1964) and multi-temporal Landsat satellite imageries (1975–2019) of the region following appropriate research methodologies. Techniques of remote sensing (RS) and GIS integration were also implemented in a robust way to measure the sinuosity index (SI) of the Meghna River (MR) course that helped to identify the tectonic influences, geomorphic changes, and neotectonics of the study area. The study reveals that as a consequence of this devastating 1950s earthquake, the course of the mighty MR was severely distorted which resulted in a significant reduction of the water flow within its YMEF section. The findings of this study suggest massive configuration changes of the landmass and river course shifting due to this colossal earthquake event. The study also indicates the presence of considerable geomorphic instability along with extensive erosion, deposition, and bank line shifting of the river within the study area during the recent period.

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Acknowledgments

We highly acknowledge the NASA-US Geological Survey (USGS) Earth Explorer team for providing freely accessible the Landsat satellite data from their archive (https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/) through the Earth Explorer data gateway. The authors are thankful to the U.S. Army Map Service Agency (AMS) and East Pakistan Geological Map Service Agency for providing the historical toposheets of the study area and its adjoining parts available as historical toposheet archive world in World Wide Web domain. In connection with the study, the authors give special thanks to the local people who participated during the field investigation. Finally, the authors are highly grateful and give special thanks to the two anonymous reviewers and Editor-in-Chief: Abdullah M. Al-Amri and Responsible editor: Stefan Grab including copyeditors for their constructive comments and suggestions which help us to improve the final and proof-read version of the manuscript.

Funding

This research work carried out as part of the M.S. program of the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, University of Chittagong, Chittagong, 4331, Bangladesh, with no external funding is available to conduct the present study. Moreover, the first author bears all expenses during the field survey and other expenses in this regard.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, University of Chittagong, Chittagong, 4331, Bangladesh

    Umme Kawser, Abdul Hoque & Biswajit Nath

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  1. Umme Kawser
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Contributions

Umme Kawser: conceptualization, software, data curation, validation, writing—original draft preparation, and revision. Abdul Hoque: conceptualization, supervision, and writing—reviewing, and editing. Biswajit Nath: conceptualization, software, data curation, validation, supervision, and writing—reviewing and editing.

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Correspondence to Biswajit Nath.

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This paper is the original study and does not contain any studies from others. All authors read and approved the submission of the manuscript.

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Informed consent was obtained from individual participants included in the study.

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Responsible editor: Stefan Grab

Supplementary Information

Supplementary data associated with this article can be found with the submission file as Table A.1. (a-f) Accuracy assessment matrix from 1975-2019.

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Kawser, U., Hoque, A. & Nath, B. Observing the impacts of 1950s great Assam earthquake in the tectono-geomorphological deformations at the Young Meghna Estuarine Floodplain of Bangladesh: evidence from Noakhali Coastal Region. Arab J Geosci 14, 306 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-020-06427-y

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