Fatal landslides in 2010: a half term report

Long term readers of this blog will know that one of its original purposes was to disseminate the work that I do collating data on fatal landslides worldwide.  As the Attabad situation reduces in its intensity I plan to return to some of those key themes.  So here is a half term report on the occurrence of fatal landslides in 2010.

Numbers of landslides:
As of the end of 30th June I had recorded a total of 235 fatal landslide events worldwide, with a distribution by month that looks like this:

This is the highest number of fatal slides for the first six months of the year that I have recorded to date (i.e. since 2003).  In comparison, this graph shows the cumulative total number of fatal landslides for 2010, for 2009 (the previous record) and on average across 2003-2009:

So clearly the number of landslides is running well ahead of the norm for the end of June (remember that globally the main landslide season is in July to September due to the effects of the Asian monsoon.  It is not clear why this should be the case, but it may be associated with the transition from El Nino to La Nina conditions. 

Loss of life:
The number of recorded fatalities is 2,168, with the monthly distribution looking like this:

Again, this is much higher than for an average year, as the cumulative total plot demonstrates.  Note that the previous highest year was 2006 in this case - 2010 is just below this total, but has shown a consistent trend throughout:

Largest events:
The largest event in terms of recorded numbers of fatalities was the 2nd March 2010 landslide at Nametsi Village, Bududa in Uganda, which killed 358 people.  However, the numbers killed by landslides in the Haiti earthquake remains unknown.


Worst affected countries:
The top ten countries in terms of numbers of fatalities is as follows:

1	China	467
2	Uganda	373
3	Brazil	334
4	Guatemala	184
5	Indonesia	118
6	Peru	103
7	India	90
8	Pakistan	61
9	Bangladesh	55
10	Kenya	23

Given the high level of landsliding so far this year, the next few months will be interesting.

July 2008 fatal landslide map

The map below shows the provisional distribution of fatal landslides for June 2008. The (again provisional) statistics are:
Number of fatal landslides: 55
Number of fatalities: 2127

Once again, the number of recorded fatalities this month has been substantially below the average for 2002-2007, which is 504 deaths. This is consistent with the monthly totals for the whole of the year - indeed at the moment 2008 has the lowest number of fatalities that I have recorded for any year, excluding the Wenchuan (Sichuan) earthquake of course. I will in due course write a post about the likely causes of this very interesting pattern.

Figure 1 shows the distribution map for July. As ever, click on the map for a bigger version. Please acknowledge any use of it or Fig. 2.

Fig. 1: July 2008 fatal landslide locations (click on the map for a larger version)

The effect of the monsoon in South Asia is now being clearly felt, with a very marked line of landslides along the southern edge of the Himalayas. The usual cluster of landslides in Central China is also clear. Once again there is a higher incidence of landslides in Central and S. America than is normal.

Fig. 2 shows all of the recorded fatal landslides in 2008 to the end of July, excluding those associated with the Wenchuan (Sichuan) earthquake. The typical annual patterns are now becoming clear, with clusters in Central China, S. Asia along the southern edge of the Himalayas, the Philippines and Central / S. America. There are certainly more recorded fatal landslides in the latter area so far this year than has been the pattern over the last few years, but there are also rather fewer in the Himalayas. The western part of the Himalayan chain (e.g. Kashmir) in particular seems to have far fewer fatalities than has been the case for the last few years.

Fig. 2: Recorded fatal landslides in 2008 up to the end of July. Each dot represents a single landslide. Click on the map for a larger version in a new window.

Please leave a comment about this map and dataset! I would really like to know what you think about the data, the maps and the general approach.
Of course, if you know of an event that I might have missed I would like to hear from you...

June 2008 fatal landslide map

The map below shows the distribution of fatal landslides for June 2008. The statistics are:
Number of fatal landslides: 43
Number of fatalities: 215

As has been the pattern all year, June was substantially below the average number of fatalities for may in 2003-2007, which is 334 deaths. Interestingly, during June there have been extensive reports of intense and prolonged rainfall events, but this does not seem to have translated into fatal landslides. The reasons for this are unclear to me.

June 2008 fatal landslide locations (click for a larger version)

The patterns that were starting to emerge in the annual map over the last few months are now clear. In particular the clusters in the Himalayas, western Central America, the Philippines and Indonesia are now very obvious. Whereas last month the cluster in the Himalayas was focused on the western part of the mountain chain, it has now extended to the east as the monsoon rainfall has intensified. The pattern of more landslides in Central America than is normal is continuing. China is continuing to get a fair number of fatal landslides. It is also interesting to see the occurrence of several landslides in SE. Europe.

Recorded fatal landslides in 2008 up to the end of June. Each dot represents a single landslide. Click on the map for a larger version in a new window.