EARTHSC 2GG3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Avalanche, Point Release, Climatology
16 Jun 2016
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May travel as a coherent block or it may rapidly disintegrate into small particles that move independently of one another. Most occur in remote, uninhabited mountains during fall, winter, and spring. Avalanche size: medium has to between 100 to 1000 m. Snow climatology: the length of the snow season depends mainly on latitude and altitude, the amount of snow on the ground depends on slope of the land, elevation, amount of snowfall and winds. Types of avalanches: point- release avalanche. Begins with failure of small amount of lose fluffy snow. Looks like triangle small top and wider in the bottom loose packs of snow and common after heavy snow fall: slab avalanche. Snowpack fractures along a weak layer at depth. Moves as cohesive block (in the beginning) More dangerous than point point release avalanche. More dangerous, cohesive slab or snow and ice moving down on the hill, cohesive block will look like snow fall.
