Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Digital maps of submarine landslides and mass wasting features offshore of southern California

September 18, 2023

This data release provides the locations and certain key metrics of landslide features offshore southern California, including landslide perimeters, scarps, evacuation zones, debris aprons, and slide-prone areas in geographic information system (GIS) shapefile format. The offshore region of southern California is a tectonically active area that includes more than 20 fault-bounded basins and ridges that are subject to various types of mass-wasting and landslide processes. The collection of high-resolution seafloor mapping data offshore southern California, mostly within the last 25 years, provide a new data set that forms the basis for the identification and mapping of landslides and slide-related features throughout the offshore region. Sixty-three discrete landslides, most of them newly recognized, more than 1400 landslide scarps, and 36 areas of mass-wasting have been identified by visual interpretation of high-resolution multibeam echosounder data (MBES), single-beam echosounder data, and seismic reflection data.

Publication Year 2023
Title Digital maps of submarine landslides and mass wasting features offshore of southern California
DOI 10.5066/P9IIWTYL
Authors Antoinette G Papesh, Maureen A Walton, James E Conrad, Daniel Brothers, Jared W Kluesner, Mary L McGann
Product Type Data Release
Record Source USGS Digital Object Identifier Catalog
USGS Organization Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center