Monitoring the crisis of a rock glacier with repeated UAV surveys

In this study, rapid topographic changes and high creeping rates caused by the destabilisation of an active rock glacier in a steep mountain flank were investigated in detail with five unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) surveys between June 2016 and September 2017. State-of-the-art photogrammetric techniques were employed to derived high-density point clouds and high-resolution orthophoto mosaics from the studied landform. The accuracy of the co-registration of subsequent point clouds was carefully examined and adjusted based on comparing stable areas outside the rock glacier, which minimised 3-D alignment errors to a mean of 0.12 m. Elevation and volumetric changes in the destabilised rock glacier were quantified over the study period. Surface kinematics were estimated with a combination of image correlation algorithms and visual inspection of the orthophoto mosaics. Between June 2016 and September 2017, the destabilised part of the rock glacier advanced up to 60–75 m and mobilised a volume of around 27 000 m3 of material which was dumped over the lower talus slope. This study has demonstrated a robust and customisable monitoring approach that allows a detailed study of rock glacier geometric changes during a crisis phase.

Abstract licence: CC BY

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