Landslides

The USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center (PCMSC) in Santa Cruz, California, has been growing our post-fire research contributions since 2017, through studies of post-fire sediment movement that address the Natural Hazards Mission Area objectives for understanding wildfire hazards.

Marine geohazards including earthquakes, landslides, and tsunamis lie offshore of densely populated areas of California, Oregon, and Washington. One goal of EXPRESS is to improve assessments of these hazards.

On California’s Big Sur coast, the steep slopes at Mud Creek suffered a catastrophic collapse (May 20, 2017). On January 28, 2021, heavy rains from a two-day storm caused debris from fire-scarred slopes to wash out another section of road at Rat Creek. USGS scientists are monitoring this 100-mile section of the California coastline, in collaboration with the CA Department of Transportation.

On May 20, 2017, the steep slopes at Mud Creek on California’s Big Sur coast, about 140 miles south of San Francisco, suffered a catastrophic collapse. USGS scientists from the Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center and the Geology, Minerals, Energy, and Geophysics Science Center continue to monitor this section of the coastline, in collaboration with the California Department of Transportation...

The Sea Floor Mapping Group (SFMG) is a core capability at the Woods Hole Coastal & Marine Science Center (WHCMSC) that provides support for coastal, lacustrine and marine geologic research. The staff has a wide-range of expertise and is responsible for geophysical and sampling data acquisition, processing, interpretation and publication, logistics, design, and research and development. SFMG has...

Numerical models are used by scientists, engineers, coastal managers, and the public to understand and predict processes in the coastal ocean. This project supports the development and application of open-source coastal models and has several objectives: 1) improve the code of numerical sediment-transport models by implementing new or improved algorithms; 2) obtain measurements of coastal ocean...

Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands are located at an active plate boundary between the North American plate and the northeast corner of the Caribbean plate. Plate movements have caused large magnitude earthquakes and devastating tsunamis. The USGS has an ongoing program to identify and map the faults in this region using various geophysical and geological methods in order to estimate the location...

On May 20, 2017, the steep slopes at Mud Creek on California’s Big Sur coast, about 140 miles south of San Francisco, suffered a catastrophic collapse. USGS Scientists from the Pacific Coastal and Marine and the Geology, Minerals, Energy, and Geophysics Science Centers are monitoring this section of the coastline, in collaboration with the California Department of Transportation.

Information about the USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center's study of tsunami hazards in the Santa Barbara Channel from 1993-2003.

Information about the USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center's studies of giant underwater landslides in 1986 and 1988.