A Study of the Hazard and Geomorphic Change Caused by Debris Flows in Iceland

Abstract

This loan formed an additional aspect to a European Facility for Airborne Research (EUFAR) funded project entitled “A Study of the Hazard and Geomorphic Change Caused by Debris Flows in Iceland”. This EUFAR project included the acquisition of LiDAR (airborne laser altimeter) and air photography by the NERC ARSF (EUFAR12_02). Four differential GPS were used by two different field teams to provide support for a NERC ARSF deployment on 27 August 2012 and over an additional week to make GPS measurements for quality-check and georeferencing purposes. These data collection activities were successful and although weather conditions prevented the key site from being surveyed, aerial data were collected elsewhere that enabled the support of a number of different projects being pursued by the project team-members. The LiDAR and air photo datasets are being used actively by the project teams to support three themes of research: 1) paraglacial slope adjustment in Iceland led by J. Coquin supervised by team member A. Decaulne, 2) a PhD project by A.M. Barratt under the supervision of team member M.R. Balme concerning periglacial landforms and 3) as an analogue for investigations into martian surface processes lead by S.J. Conway. Because airborne LiDAR data could not be collected near Ísafjörður we performed GPS surveys over two new debris flows to contribute to the initial project aims and to the monitoring dataset are building on the debris flows in this area. These data will be used in a new PhD project concerning mass flows in Iceland, to start in October 2014.