Unified landslide hazard assessment using hurdle models: a case study in the Island of Dominica

Bryce, E., Lombardo, L., van Westen, C., Tanyas, H. and Castro-Camilo, D. (2022) Unified landslide hazard assessment using hurdle models: a case study in the Island of Dominica. Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment, 36(8), pp. 2071-2084. (doi: 10.1007/s00477-022-02239-6)

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Abstract

Climatically-induced natural hazards are a threat to communities. They can cause life losses and heavy damage to infrastructure, and due to climate change, they have become increasingly frequent. This is especially the case in tropical regions, where major hurricanes have consistently appeared in recent history. Such events induce damage due to the high wind speed they carry, and the high intensity/duration of rainfall they discharge can further induce a chain of hydro-morphological hazards in the form of widespread debris slides/flows. The way the scientific community has developed preparatory steps to mitigate the potential damage of these hydro-morphological threats includes assessing where they are likely to manifest across a given landscape. This concept is referred to as susceptibility, and it is commonly achieved by implementing binary classifiers to estimate probabilities of landslide occurrences. However, predicting where landslides can occur may not be sufficient information, for it fails to convey how large landslides may be. This work proposes using a flexible Bernoulli-log-Gaussian hurdle model to simultaneously model landslide occurrence and size per areal unit. Covariate and spatial information are introduced using a generalised additive modelling framework. To cope with the high spatial resolution of the data, our model uses a Markovian representation of the Matérn covariance function based on the stochastic partial differential equation approach. Assuming Gaussian priors, our model can be integrated into the class of latent Gaussian models, for which inference is conveniently performed based on the integrated nested Laplace approximation method. We use our modelling approach in Dominica, where hurricane Maria (September 2017) induced thousands of shallow flow-like landslides passing over the island. Our results show that we can not only estimate where landslides may occur and how large they may be, but we can also combine this information in a unified landslide hazard model, which is the first of its kind.

Item Type:Articles
Additional Information:This work was supported by the Additional Funding Programme for Mathematical Sciences, delivered by EPSRC (EP/V521917/1) and the Heilbronn Institute for Mathematical Research.
Status:Published
Refereed:Yes
Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID:Castro-Camilo, Dr Daniela and Bryce, Erin
Authors: Bryce, E., Lombardo, L., van Westen, C., Tanyas, H., and Castro-Camilo, D.
College/School:College of Science and Engineering > School of Mathematics and Statistics > Statistics
Journal Name:Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment
Publisher:Springer
ISSN:1436-3240
ISSN (Online):1436-3259
Published Online:02 June 2022
Copyright Holders:Copyright © 2022 The Authors
First Published:First published in Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment 36(8): 2071-2084
Publisher Policy:Reproduced under a Creative Commons License

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