Characterizing and monitoring rockslides from SAR techniques Original Research Article

Worldwide, thousands of landslides occur annually moving millions of tons of material. Based on estimates from the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies there are on average 1550 landslide-related deaths per year. Developing new remote sensing techniques to identify, characterise and monitor motion of landslides will assist in the current national landslide inventory and hazard mapping in mountainous areas. Recent research has shown that interferometric SAR techniques can be used to monitor landslide motion under limited conditions. In this study we used interferometrically derived images, to monitor post-slide motion and a RADARSAT fine mode image to characterise the debris size and distribution of a 30 × 106 m3 rock avalanche, in the Canadian Rockies. These techniques will assist in the understanding of landslide processes, post-failure mechanism and mobility.