Images

Swimming pool sign spray-painted to warn first responders and others to be careful around the potentially dangerous area. 

The Dec. 4, 2017 Thomas fire, Southern California's largest wildfire on record, burned more than 280,000 acres across Ventura and Santa Barbara counties for nearly a month.

Geologists assess boulders displaced during the Montecito debris flow event on Jan. 9, 2018.  

Excerpt of satellite image showing landslide impacts to roads, agriculture, and a reservoir in the Lares Municipality. Points identify the approximate location of roads visibly impacted by landslides. Image filename contains approximate latitude and longitude of this impact location.

Building damage caused by a slow landslide in Boyd County, Kentucky, 2017 

Numerous debris flows caused by intense rainfall from Hurricane Maria in September 2017 in Puerto Rico. Trees are bare due to the hurricane force winds that stripped the leaves. 

USGS air photo of the Mud Creek landslide, taken on May 27, 2017

Shallow landslides damaged homes and closed many roads in the San Francisco East Bay region as a result of storms in January and February, 2017.

Landslide caused by intense rainfall in February 2017 in King County, WA. The rapid landslide destroyed a garage and a large propane tank. 

Photograph showing a landslide-dammed lake in the headwaters of the Hapuku River in the Seaward Kaikoura mountain range in New Zealand.

Photograph showing Papatea Fault surface rupture near Waipapa Bay in New Zealand. The fault moved about 10 m horizontally and uplifted shoreline platform about 2 m at this location.

Photograph showing landslides covering State Route 1 near Ohau Point. The route was impacted my several landslides and is the main north-south highway on the eastern part of the South Island of New Zealand.

USGS hydrologist Mark Reid examines an extensional basin in the middle of the Oso landslide deposit.  The headscarp (near-vertical cliff at the back of the landslide) is visible at the top of the image.  The prominent tree is one of many that fell and became perched as the landslide spread out over the river valley.

View of Glacier Bay National Park from the air.

Photograph taken from a Colorado National Guard helicopter looking north down the West Salt Creek rock avalanche deposit. On May 25, 2014, the central core of the rock avalanche deposit continued to move for 1-2 hours after the main rock avalanche deposit had stopped moving.

An oblique LIDAR image of La Conchita, Calif., reveals the community’s grim landslide history. The 1995 landslide is outlined in blue and the 2005 landslide in yellow, while a red line overhead outlines the main scarp of an ancient landslide that involved the entire bluff. Arrows show other landslides in the area.

This landslide occurred at La Conchita, California in 2005. Ten people were killed.

Building damage caused by a slow landslide in Boyd County, Kentucky. Previous repairs reveal that the landslide has moved in the past. 

USGS hydrologist Mark Reid looks at one of the many grabens (extensional basins) that formed as the Oso landslide swept across the North Fork Stillaguamish River valley.

USGS civil engineer Brian Collins examines blocks of glacial till that form parts of the Oso landslide deposit.

A volcano monitoring “spider” was deployed by helicopter to the Oso landslide to track ground movement and seismicity while search-and-rescue operations were ongoing.  The spider was equipped with a seismometer (mounted on the far left leg) to track ground shaking and GPS (a dome-shaped instrument on the upper mast) to track subtle ground movement.