Enhancement and Application of Numerical Methods for Snow Avalanche Modelling

Enhancement and Application of Numerical Methods for Snow Avalanche Modelling
Author: Jordi Castello Sant
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2020
Genre:
ISBN:

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The application of numerical methods to model snow avalanches is of vital importance since in recent years there has been a notable increase in people exposed to risk areas due to the practice of mountain sports. The creation of tools capable of forecasting and simulating avalanches represents a step forward in minimizing the personal and economic costs caused by these natural disasters. With the collaboration of the Institut Flumen and the hydraulic modelling software Iber, it has been possible to develop a valid application for the simulation of snow avalanches using finite volumes. On account of this, the friction terms of the Saint Venant equations were previously modified to be valid for describing the behaviour of these non-Newtonian fluids. This Thesis analyses the parameters of friction, cohesion and slope to study how they affect the descent of avalanches. In addition, the numerical scheme is extended by incorporating the parameter of entrainment and four equations are developed that depend, independently, on velocity, snow height and bed shear stress. Thenceforth, the model is calibrated, and the equations are compared taking into account the field data of an avalanche registered in the area of Vallter, located in the Pyrenees of Girona. Finally, once the model has been determined to be sufficiently robust, the event of a historical avalanche that occurred in the ancient village of Àrreu -Pyrenees of Lleida- where nineteen inhabitants lost their lives is studied. For the first time, a study is proposed on how this fateful event happened, taking into account the existing historical documentation, and different current methods of protection and containment are proposed to prevent it from happening again.

Avalanche Dynamics

Avalanche Dynamics
Author: S.P. Pudasaini
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 614
Release: 2007-06-30
Genre: Science
ISBN: 3540326871

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Avalanches, mudflows and landslides are common and natural phenomena that occur in mountainous regions. With an emphasis on snow avalanches, this book provides a survey and discussion about the motion of avalanche-like flows from initiation to run out. An important aspect of this book is the formulation and investigation of a simple but appropriate continuum mechanical model for the realistic prediction of geophysical flows of granular material.

Numerical Simulation of Snow Avalanche Flow (Classic Reprint)

Numerical Simulation of Snow Avalanche Flow (Classic Reprint)
Author: T. E. Lang
Publisher: Forgotten Books
Total Pages: 62
Release: 2017-10-28
Genre:
ISBN: 9781528021494

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Excerpt from Numerical Simulation of Snow Avalanche Flow Many homes, lodges, and other structures are now being built in steep, snow-covered areas of the western U. S. Snow avalanches are a threat at many of these sites. Land managers, county commissioners, and other local authorities need information on the location of avalanche paths and the frequency and intensity of avalanches to safeguard the public and still permit orderly growth of mountain communities. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Contributions to the Calibration and Global Sensitivity Analysis of Snow Avalanche Numerical Models

Contributions to the Calibration and Global Sensitivity Analysis of Snow Avalanche Numerical Models
Author: Maria Belen Heredia Guzman
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2020
Genre:
ISBN:

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Snow avalanche is a natural hazard defined as a snow mass in fast motion. Since the thirties, scientists have been designing snow avalanche models to describe snow avalanches. However, these models depend on some poorly known input parameters that cannot be measured. To understand better model input parameters and model outputs, the aims of this thesis are (i) to propose a framework to calibrate input parameters and (ii) to develop methods to rank input parameters according to their importance in the model taking into account the functional nature of outputs. Within these two purposes, we develop statistical methods based on Bayesian inference and global sensitivity analyses. All the developments are illustrated on test cases and real snow avalanche data.First, we propose a Bayesian inference method to retrieve input parameter distribution from avalanche velocity time series having been collected on experimental test sites. Our results show that it is important to include the error structure (in our case the autocorrelation) in the statistical modeling in order to avoid bias for the estimation of friction parameters.Second, to identify important input parameters, we develop two methods based on variance based measures. For the first method, we suppose that we have a given data sample and we want to estimate sensitivity measures with this sample. Within this purpose, we develop a nonparametric estimation procedure based on the Nadaraya-Watson kernel smoother to estimate aggregated Sobol' indices. For the second method, we consider the setting where the sample is obtained from acceptance/rejection rules corresponding to physical constraints. The set of input parameters become dependent due to the acceptance-rejection sampling, thus we propose to estimate aggregated Shapley effects (extension of Shapley effects to multivariate or functional outputs). We also propose an algorithm to construct bootstrap confidence intervals. For the snow avalanche model application, we consider different uncertainty scenarios to model the input parameters. Under our scenarios, the release avalanche position and volume are the most crucial inputs.Our contributions should help avalanche scientists to (i) account for the error structure in model calibration and (ii) rankinput parameters according to their importance in the models using statistical methods.

To the Question of the Numerical Modelling of the Water-saturated Ground Masses and the Snow (glacier) Avalanches Motion at the Intrustion in the Mountain Water Storage Basins and Lakes

To the Question of the Numerical Modelling of the Water-saturated Ground Masses and the Snow (glacier) Avalanches Motion at the Intrustion in the Mountain Water Storage Basins and Lakes
Author: International Conference on Numerical Modelling of River, Channel and Overland Flow for Water Resources and Environmental Applications
Publisher:
Total Pages: 10
Release: 1981
Genre:
ISBN:

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