Experimental analysis of tsunamis generated by the impact of landslides with high mobility

Highlights • Amplitudes of near-field waves generated by highly mobile flows are independent of slide volume for a given reservoir depth. • Depth-limited breaking is the primary control on the wave amplitude as waves propagate into the far-field. • Effective time and length of forcing are important factors that influence momentum transfer. Landslides into water can generate massive tsunamis which are major natural hazards in coastal regions. In this study, waves were generated in a series of 41 laboratory experiments by releasing 4 different slide volumes ranging from 0.1-0.4 m3 of highly mobile material down a 6.73 m long slope into a reservoir of depth varying from 0.15-0.65 m, to achieve a wide range of dimensionless landslide parameter values. Water is used as the sliding material and with zero internal shear strength it is representative of the upper limit of high landslide mobility. The slide characteristics of thickness and velocity were measured at impact using high speed cameras and the time series of the resulting changes in water surface elevation were measured using nine wave probes along the 33.8 m long flume. The experimental results indicate that in the near-field the maximum wave amplitude is dependent on the landslide thickness and velocity and is relatively independent of the reservoir water depth. As waves propagate to the far-field, the depth-limited breaking reduces the wave amplitude, such that the maximum wave amplitude is highly dependent on the reservoir depth. The wave breaking limit, which differentiates the breaking from the non-breaking waves, is defined by the relationship am/h = 0.6 that is very closely adhered to for all source volumes and reservoir depths. The time and length over which the waves are generated are determined from the digital imagery, and are used to describe the scales of the momentum transfer. These observations are compared with previously published empirical and theoretical equations for granular landslides and positively buoyant avalanches, indicating that water is a useful source material for simulating highly mobile landslides. Since these parameters are difficult to obtain in field cases, a simplification of the theoretical equation is presented and this yields reasonable results for the maximum wave amplitude generated by slides with high mobility