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Downstream Geomorphic Response of the 2014 Mount Polley Tailings Dam Failure, British Columbia

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Abstract

On August 4, 2014, the failure of the Tailings Storage Facility dam at the Mount Polley copper and gold mine in British Columbia (Canada) produced a dynamic and complex geomorphic response downstream. The dam breach was caused by rotational sliding of the embankment due to foundation failure, resulting in sudden loss of containment of water and tailings. The released volume was estimated to be 25 Mm3. The resulting flow traveled approximately 9 km down the Hazeltine Creek valley over a vertical elevation of 205 m. The August 2014 event is the largest tailings dam failure recorded in Canada and the second largest recorded globally in the last decade. This investigation documents and analyzes the general downstream geomorphic response of the event in the Hazeltine Creek channel and floodplain. It utilizes an integrated approach of geomorphological mapping, topographic analysis, historical aerial photograph analysis, and field surveys to identify and quantify the geomorphic impacts of the event. Overall results indicate that these impacts are significant and comparable to those resulting from extreme debris flow and outburst flood events in mountainous environments in Canada and worldwide.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Imperial Metals for providing pre- and post-event data. The interpretation of the data represents the views of the authors. We also thank Cory McGregor for field work support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Environment and Geoscience Infrastructure, SNC-Lavalin Inc, 640th 5 Avenue, Calgary, AB, T2P 3G4, Canada

    Vanessa Cuervo, Hawley Beaugrand & Megan Hendershot

  2. Department of Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Waterloo, 200 University Avenue West, Waterloo, ON, N2L 3G1, Canada

    Vanessa Cuervo & Stephen G. Evans

  3. Stantec Consulting Ltd, 400-1620 Dickson Avenue, Kelowna, BC, V1Y 9Y2, Canada

    Leif Burge

  4. Geography & Earth and Environmental Science, Okanagan College, 1000 KLO Road, Kelowna, BC, V1Y 4X8, Canada

    Leif Burge

Authors
  1. Vanessa Cuervo
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  2. Leif Burge
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  3. Hawley Beaugrand
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  4. Megan Hendershot
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  5. Stephen G. Evans
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Vanessa Cuervo .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Civil and Geodetic Engineering, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia

    Matjaž Mikoš

  2. Faculty of Science, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic

    Vít Vilímek

  3. China Institute of Geo-Environment Monitoring, China Geological Survey, Beijing, China

    Yueping Yin

  4. International Consortium on Landslides (ICL), Kyoto, Japan

    Kyoji Sassa

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© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG

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Cuervo, V., Burge, L., Beaugrand, H., Hendershot, M., Evans, S.G. (2017). Downstream Geomorphic Response of the 2014 Mount Polley Tailings Dam Failure, British Columbia . In: Mikoš, M., Vilímek, V., Yin, Y., Sassa, K. (eds) Advancing Culture of Living with Landslides. WLF 2017. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53483-1_33

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