‘Rensing and anarchy’: invisible, unpredictable force behind deadly rockfall

Scientist Daniel Sugar says that images after Thursday’s deadly rockslide in Bainf National Park provide evidence of its cause – the water flowing through the interior of the mountain.

“You can really see some springs coming out of the rock and are actually coming out of the mark,” said the University of Calgary Professor of Geomorphology.

He explained how the water had been seeping through the rocks for decades from a lake above the rock in Bo Glacier Falls, before it finally provided enough force to dislike a boulder, trigger the rockfall.

“That lake has been present since 1955,” he said. “So in the last 70 years, the water from this lake (and) has been trying to go down through the glacier retrieving cracks. It essentially provides pressure to dislike the rock.”

Listen Geomorphologist provides insight into rocklides

While the forces may have built over the years, sugar and other scientists agree that it would be impossible for the park to predict or stop a large -scale rockfall for Canada.

He said, “Yesterday there was a bad confluence of incidents where this part of the rock essentially came out of the rock,” he said. “And, you know, unfortunately, sadly, there were hikers below.”

Experts agreed that it is easy to see evidence of previous rockfalls, predicting when they will be, it is impossible.

David Elmo, a mining engineering professor at the University of British Columbia, said that a rock face from outside has not shown what is happening inside.

“Some people may ask Park Canada, why did you not do anything about it,” Elmo said, who has a degree in engineering geology and an expert in rock mechanics.

“Well, that kind of rockfall cannot be stopped.”

He said that the only thing that the authorities can do is to tell the public about the risks when they enter an area that can suffer from rockfall.

“We know they will be. We don’t know when they will be,” Elmo said.

The witnesses reported that the rumbles and stones were loosened downwards before a slab of the mountain and the hickers were rained down.

The rockfall occurred in a beautiful area close to a popular scar. Looking forward, Elmo said that the authorities should put a notice in the area, the hikers should warns to “reduce time” spent at that location.

Elmo said, “You can take pictures from a distance, but don’t stay under the slope. This is the worst place.”

John J, an emeritus professor at Earth Sciences at Simon Fraser University. Clag said that when he sees Banf and Jasper landscape, he sees a lot of cones where there have been rockfalls in the past.

“Really predict where someone is going to be, until you have some pre -indications that something was going on, would be very difficult.” He said.

Clag said that rockfalls are common in the southern Rocky mountain, but most are never seen.

Thursday’s slide included “people were in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Clag said.

John Pomeroy, a Canadian Research Chairman in Water Resources and Climate Change at Suskechewan University, said that there was no early indicator from the water level at Iceberg Lake, feeding to the Glacier Falls, which could predict the tragedy.

He said, “There is a lot of random and chaos in events like rock slide, so the circumstances were probably favorable, but it happened that it was only misfortune,” he said.

“And especially the day of the day was happening when people there were very bad luck.”

Pomeroy said that this year, the glacier quickly started melting, raising the water level in the Himshil Lake before normal.

“This is definitely more dangerous due to climate change, but it is difficult to say that climate change caused a particular event,” he said.

Clag said that all the glaciers in Canada had to go through the warming climate and retreat, and they feel that the incident is related to climate change.

“Because the rockfall at that place could not happen until the face is completely free from snow.”