Avalanche Essay

For Avalanche identification (slope, elevation, aspect, curvature and terrain roughness index) were the required parameters which were used for Siachen area and on the basis of these parameters maps were generated. In this study all these required parameters work together and according to their suitability ratios they identify the areas which is highly, moderately, marginally, and hazards for this avalanches in Siachen glacier.

Land cover identification

The glaciated region of northern Pakistan has its own significance as they are the major source of fresh water in Pakistan. The particular region of Siachen has its own importance regarding to defense purpose as it’s a territory between India and Pakistan. In this regard continuous monitoring and mapping of this area is very important. In this study for mapping of avalanches in this area landsat 8 data set has been used to classify the land cover. Object based classification was used in this study and seven classes were obtained.

The classification showed that maximum area in this land cover about 6619 square kilometer was occupied by snow because of the high altitude and low temperature

Below this 28 degree force of gravity is weak. Slope steeper than 50 degree can initiate small avalanches. Avalanches mostly occur frequently on the slope of 30 to 45 degrees [61]. Land use is very important in the port of the snow cover to the ground, so region which contains forest, shrubs and trees are barred from the potential release areas and add to slope roughness and thus provide the more stability [61] [62]. Land cover in this study area contains maximum snow and very small region of trees, forest and shrubs comparatively so the maximum land cover has slope angle above 30 degree. Slope map obtained from dataset has the minimum slope of 7 degree and maximum slope of 87