Cryosphere hazards in Ladakh: the 2014 Gya glacial lake outburst flood and its implications for risk assessment
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Cryosphere hazards in Ladakh: the 2014 Gya glacial lake outburst flood and its implications for risk assessment Susanne Schmidt1 · Marcus Nüsser1,2 · Ravi Baghel1 · Juliane Dame1,2 Received: 7 March 2020 / Accepted: 24 August 2020 © The Author(s) 2020
Abstract This article attempts to reconstruct the causes and consequences of the 2014 glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) event in Gya, Ladakh. We analyse the evolution of the Gya glacial lake using a high temporal and high spatial resolution remote sensing approach. In order to frame the case study in a larger picture, we produce a comprehensive inventory of glacial lakes for the entire Trans-Himalayan region of Ladakh. Changes in the extent and number of glacial lakes have been detected for the years 1969, 1993, 2000/02 and 2018 in order to assess the potential risk of future GLOFs in the region. The remote sensing approach was supported by field surveys between 2014 and 2019. The case study of the Gya GLOF illustrates the problem of potentially hazardous lakes being overlooked in inventories. The broader analysis of the Ladakh region and in-depth analysis of one GLOF lead us to propose an integrated approach for detecting undocumented GLOFs. This article demonstrates the necessity for using multiple methods to ensure robustness of risk assessment. The improved understanding can lead to a more accurate evaluation of exposure to cryosphere hazards and identification of alternative mechanisms and spatial patterns of GLOFs in the Himalaya. Keywords Cryosphere hazards · GLOF · Tunneling of ice-cored moraines · Ice-covered lakes · Ladakh · India
1 Introduction Cryosphere dynamics and cryosphere-related hazards are a vital component of and threat for land use development in the semi-arid Trans-Himalayan region of Ladakh. The observed and projected glacier decrease in the extended Himalayan region (Bolch et al. 2019) and specifically in Ladakh (Schmidt and Nüsser 2017) will affect livelihood security, both in the mountains and in the lowlands in the long run (Hock et al. 2019; Huss and Hock 2018; Immerzeel et al. 2010; Nüsser et al. 2019). In the short term, glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs) are major cryosphere hazards and a potential risk for local communities * Marcus Nüsser marcus.nuesser@uni‑heidelberg.de 1
South Asia Institute, Department of Geography, Heidelberg University, Heidelberg, Germany
2
Heidelberg Centre for the Environment (HCE), Heidelberg University, Heidelberg, Germany
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Natural Hazards
as lakes are formed and grow due to deglaciation (Carey et al. 2017; Carrivick and Tweed 2016; Emmer and Vilímek 2013; Emmer 2018; Rasul and Molden 2019). On 6 August 2014, a glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) hit the village of Gya (33° 39′ N, 77° 44′ E) in Ladakh. GLOF events are not a new phenomenon in the upper Indus basin: a number of such events have been reported from the Karakoram and Western Himalaya dating back to the nineteenth century (Hewitt 1982; Hewitt and Liu 2010; Iturrizaga 2019). Large and recurrent GLOF events h
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