Andrée Blais-Stevens

Natural Resources Canada | NRCan · Geological Survey of Canada

Mean annual temperatures in the Arctic and subarctic have increased in recent decades, increasing the number of permafrost hazards. Retrogressive thaw slumps (RTSs), triggered by the thawing of ground ice in permafrost soil, have become more common in the Arctic. Many studies report an increase in RTS activity on a local or regional scale. In this...

The Texas Creek rock avalanche is a prehistoric deposit in the Fraser River Canyon, 17 km south of Lillooet, southwestern British Columbia, Canada. Original mapping suggested that the debris consisted of two landslides: a 45 Mm³ event deposited after the Mazama tephra but before about 2 ka ago, and a 7.2 Mm³ event about 1.1 ka ago. The proposed tim...

In a warming climate, weather driven mountain hazards, and rainfall-triggered landslides in particular, represent one of the greatest growing threats to co-located populations, infras- tructure, and communities 1–3. Coupled with a simultaneous increase in the number of people and infrastructure exposed to those same hazards ⁴, the global risk assoc...

Preliminary observations of slope movements in British Columbia, Alberta and Nunavut from InSAR RadarSat Constellation Mission (RCM)

Pipelines are a critical component of transportation infrastructure. They offer the safest and most efficient way to transport large volumes of oil and natural gas from development areas to refineries and consumers. Landslides can damage pipelines resulting in a spill of a toxic substance. However, landslide hazards to pipelines and other infrastru...

Landslides are a recurring geomorphological process in high mountainous areas like Valemount in the Canadian Rocky Mountains, British Columbia. The compilation of detailed information about the spatial distribution and characteristics of past landslides is essential for assessing future potential hazards. To provide baseline geoscience information...

No abstract for this introductory article.

Landslides are the most common natural hazard in British Columbia. The province has recorded the largest number of historical landslide fatalities in Canada, and damage to infrastructure comes at a great cost. In order to understand the potential impacts of landslides, radar remote sensing has become a cost-effective method for detecting downslope...

The use of time-series radar interferometry (InSAR) to monitor critical highways, railways, and pipelines affected by landslides that are triggered by coastal erosion, spring snowmelt, permafrost thaw, monsoons, and hurricanes.

The Yukon-Alaska Highway corridor in southern Yukon is subject to geohazards ranging from landslides to floods and earthquakes on faults in the St. Elias Mountains and Shakwak Valley. Here we discuss the late Holocene seismic history of the Denali fault, located at the eastern front of the St. Elias Mountains and one of only a few known seismically...

A map of historical Canadian landslides resulting in fatalities from 1771-2018 has been compiled using technical and scientific reports, newspaper articles, and provincial websites as sources of information. The map is regularly updated. A total 774 people have perished in Canada historically because of landslides. British Columbia (BC) experienced...

In studies of socioeconomic change along the late Holocene Northwest Coast (NWC), a model based on the link between more intensive use of abundant salmon and development of ‘complex’ socioeconomic traits has been frequently cited. Both characteristics have been documented in many Marpole period sites. Recent research has however cast doubt on this...

A 6.3 m tsunami swept through Kitimat Arm, British Columbia in 1974. An even larger wave struck and damaged the Northlands Navigation dock at Kitimat and the Haisla First Nation docks at Kitamaat Village the following year. Further down the fjord, two large coastal block failures were observed on the fjord walls across from the Gitga'at village of...

The 105-km long Kitimat-Morice River corridor features mostly interconnecting valleys linking the coastal community of Kitimat in northwestern British Columbia with the interior valley system of Morice River. Surficial geology, landslide inventory and terrain stability mapping were carried out for the corridor. Over 150 landslide deposits of variou...

The random forest method was used to generate susceptibility maps for debris flows, rock slides, and active layer detachment slides in the Donjek River area within the Yukon Alaska Highway Corridor, based on an inventory of landslides compiled by the Geological Survey of Canada in collaboration with the Yukon Geological Survey. The aim of this stud...

The random forest method was used to generate susceptibility maps for debris flows, rock slides, and active layer detachment slides in the Donjek River area within the Yukon Alaska Highway Corridor, based on an inventory of landslides compiled by the Geological Survey of Canada in collaboration with the Yukon Geological Survey. The aim of this stud...

The Lakelse Lake area in northwestern British Columbia, Canada, has a long history, and prehistory, of rapid sensitive clay landslides moving on very low gradients. However, until now, many landslides have gone undetected. We use an array of modern tools to identify hitherto unknown or poorly known landslide deposits, including acoustic subbottom p...

Lakelse Lake is an 8.7 km long freshwater lake located in the Skeena River watershed, about 10 km south of Terrace in northwestern British Columbia. The lake is surrounded by mountainous terrain flanked by sediments from the last glacial period. Some of the sediments are sensitive glaciomarine muds, prone to destructive landslides. The presence of...

Quantifying rock fall hazards requires information about their frequency and volumes. Previous studies have focused on quantifying rock fall volume–frequency relationships or the weather conditions antecedent to rock fall occurrences, and their potential use as prediction tools. This paper is focused on quan- tifying rock fall occurrence probabilit...

It is a map compilation of historical landslide events that have caused fatalities (1771-2015) in Canada. It was first published in 2014, but was updated in 2015.

Douglas Channel is a 100-km long fjord located in northwest British Columbia with the town of Kitimat and Kitimaat village located at its head. The Geological Survey of Canada, as part of Natural Resources Canada’s Public Safety Geoscience Program, provides baseline geoscience information to help inform stakeholders and decision-makers. The main ob...

Surficial geology and landslide inventory of upper Sea to Sky highway corridor

Surficial geology and landslide inventory of middle Sea to Sky highway map area.

Surficial Geology map and landslide inventory of lower Sea to Sky Highway area, southern British Columbia.

Abstract. This research activity aimed at reducing risk to infrastructure, such as a proposed pipeline route roughly parallel to the Yukon Alaska Highway Corridor (YAHC), by filling geoscience knowledge gaps in geohazards. Hence, the Geological Survey of Canada compiled an inventory of landslides including debris flow deposits, which were subsequen...

Lakelse Lake is an 8.7 km long freshwater lake located in the Skeena River watershed, about 10 km south of Terrace in northwestern British Columbia. The lake is surrounded by mountainous terrain flanked by sediments deposited during the last glacial period (Clague, 1984). Some of the sediments consist of sensitive glaciomarine sediments, making it...

This research activity aimed at reducing risk to infrastructure, such as a proposed pipeline route roughly parallel to the Yukon Alaska Highway Corridor (YAHC) by filling geoscience knowledge gaps in geohazards. Hence, the Geological Survey of Canada compiled an inventory of landslides including debris flow deposits, which were subsequently used to...

On July 13, 2005 a complex 3 Mm3 and 1.5 km long rock slide-debris avalanche occurred near Sutherland River, 40 km west of Fort St. James, British Columbia, Canada. The landslide was initiated in a succession of sub-horizontal competent mafic basalts (Endako Formation) capping weaker felsic volcanic and volcaniclastic rocks (Ootsa Lake Group) of Eo...

The Yukon portion of the Alaska Highway Corridor traverses the discontinuous permafrost zone. Air-photos and high resolution satellite imagery were used to produce an updated landslide inventory (2013) that identified 1,600 landslides in the corridor. Landslide susceptibility models were developed for the corridor for two types of landslides trigge...

Preliminary investigation of the history of sedimentation in lower Howe Sound fjord near Vancouver, B.C. indicates that no rock slide capable of generating a destructive displacement wave has occurred during the latter half of the Holocene. Possible rock slide run-out deposits were detected along the western margin of Bowen Island. These could date...

An investigation into evidence of deposits of rapidly moving landslides that may have triggered displacement waves during the post glacial period in Howe Sound, British Columbia, was initiated by the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC) in collaboration with researchers from the Department of Earth Sciences, Simon Fraser University. It consisted of tw...

Re paper:We understand the point of view taken by Yilmaz et al. We take their approach as just one of many to explore in the future. However, for this study all the steps were explained in our approach to building a landslide inventory, susceptibility mapping using both methods, and validating. We also addressed how our models could be improved in...

We studied 30 large debris fans along the Alaska Highway between the Alaska-Yukon boundary near Beaver Creek and the south end of Kluane Lake to document late Holocene and historic debris flow activity and to evaluate the hazard that debris flows pose to the highway and other infrastructure. We used dendrochronology and tephrochronology to date sur...

Preliminary investigation of the history of sedimentation in lower Howe Sound fjord near Vancouver, B.C. indicates that no rock slide capable of generating a destructive displacement wave has occurred during the latter half of the Holocene. Possible rock slide run-out deposits were detected along the western margin of Bowen Island. These could date...

In Canada’s north, slope stability is a critical issue affecting infrastructure. There are several types of landslides and ground hazard features that are directly related to the presence of permafrost: active layer detachment slides, retrogressive thaw flows, solifluction, thermo-karstic depressions, and rock glaciers. A landslide inventory and pr...

The Geological Survey of Canada (GSC) initiated a project in 2009 to develop national landslide guidelines and best practices as part of its natural hazard loss reduction effort. This project is part of the International Program on Landslides sponsored by the International Consortium on Landslides. A literature review was carried out as part of thi...

The Sea to Sky corridor stretches over a distance of 135 km into British Columbia’s Coast Mountains. The corridor has witnessed hundreds of historical and pre-historic landslides. In the last 154 years, 155 landslide events have been reported. The most common types of landslides are rockfalls and debris flows, which are small in volume, but can be...

The Sea to Sky Corridor has experienced hundreds of historic and prehistoric landslides. The most common types of historical landslides are rock falls and debris flows, which are relatively small in volume but can be damaging. These types of failures are more common in the southern part of the corridor, between Horseshoe Bay and Porteau, where infr...

The Earth Science Sector of Natural Resources Canada, through its Geoscience for Public Safety Program, has initiated the development of national technical guidelines and best practices related to landslides. With this initiative, Canada, as a world leader in the field, will actively contribute to reduce losses from landslides. The guidelines will...

In 2009, the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC) initiated a project to develop national landslide guidelines and best practices as part of its natural hazard loss reduction effort. A literature review has been carried out as part of this project. More than 30 landslide guidelines from around the world were collected. This paper presents a brief revi...

Natural Resources Canada has initiated the development of national technical guidelines and best practices related to landslides. With this initiative, Canada, as a world leader in the field, will actively contribute to reduce losses from landslides. The guidelines will provide Canadian engineers, geoscientists and other landslide practitioners wit...

Barnacles have never been successfully dated by electron spin resonance (ESR). Living mainly in the intertidal zone, barnacles die when sea level changes cause their permanent exposure. Thus, dating the barnacles dates past sea level changes. From this, we can measure apparent sea level changes that occur due to ocean volume changes, crustal isosta...

A reanalysis of the varve chronology from hydraulic piston sediment cores was carried out to establish better uncertainty estimates on ages of prehistoric debris-flow deposits (DFDs) in the last 4000 yr. Saanich Inlet is an anoxic fiord located in southeast Vancouver Island near the city of Victoria, British Columbia. It contains annually laminated...

Destructive landslides are common in west central British Columbia. Landslides include debris flows and slides, earth flows and flowslides, rock falls, slides, and avalanches, and complex landslides involving both rock and soil. Pipelines, hydrotransmission lines, roads, and railways have all been impacted by these landslides, disrupting service to...

RÉSUMÉ L'autoroute Sea to Sky s'étend sur une distance de 110 km de Horseshoe Bay à Pemberton, C.-B. Historiquement, ce corridor de transport a été et reste exposé aux glissements de terrain. Plus de 18% du total d'accidents mortels au Canada reliés aux glissements de terrain (>600) ont eu lieu dans ce corridor. Selon un inventaire effectué à parti...

On July 13, 2005 a complex rock slide -debris avalanche occurred near Sutherland River, 40 km west of Fort St. James, British Columbia. The landslide impact was powerful enough to leave a seismic signal at the Fort St. James seismic station. The rapid landslide travelled 1.45 km and involved 3M m 3 of volcanic rock and soil. The landslide bifurcate...

Landslides in coastal environments are caused by rapid sedimentation, earthquakes, storm surges, wave action, and human activity. They may trigger destructive tsunamis, especially in fiords or lakes where wave energy is focused. Consequently, development of Canada’s marine and lake shorelines requires an understanding of landslide-generated tsunami...

Destructive landslides are common in west central British Columbia (BC). Landslides include debris flows and slides, earth flows and flowslides, rock falls, slides, and avalanches, and complex landslides involving both rock and soil. Pipelines, hydro transmission lines, roads and railways have all been impacted by these landslides, disrupting servi...

On November 28, 2003, at about 00:30 PST, 35km east of Prince Rupert in northwestern British Columbia, an extremely rapid, retrogressive liquefaction earth flow, or a clay flow-slide, severed the natural gas pipeline. As a result, Prince Rupert residents were without natural gas heat for 10 days. The landslide has a steep main scarp that is 45m hig...

On November 28, 2003, at about 00:30 PST, on the Khyex River, 35 km east of Prince Rupert in northwestern British Columbia, a low gradient extremely rapid, liquefaction earthflow, or a clay flowslide severed the natural gas pipeline. Displaced material flowed up and down river over a distance of 1.7 km, blocked the river, and caused flooding upstre...

The Virden area study is part of the Southern Prairies NATMAP Project. In general, the area is flat and characterized by thick drift. Surface materials consist of till, clay, silt, sand, and gravel. The thickness of drift varies from as little as 1 m, where a single till sheet overlies bedrock, to more than 100 m in buried valleys and where multipl...

Two anomalous, gray, silty clay beds are present in ODP cores collected from Saanich Inlet, Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. The beds, which date to about 10,500 14Cyr BP (11,000 calendar years BP), contain Tertiary pollen derived from sedimentary rocks found only in the Fraser Lowland, on the mainland of British Columbia and Washington...

Two anomalous, gray, silty clay beds are present in ODP cores collected from Saanich Inlet, Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. The beds, which date to about 10,500 14C yr BP (11,000 calendar years BP), contain Tertiary pollen derived from sedimentary rocks found only in the Fraser Lowland, on the mainland of British Columbia and Washington...

This paper explores the paleoseismic record potentially preserved in the upper 40 m of hydraulic piston cores collected in 1996 at two sites in Saanich Inlet, British Columbia, during ocean drilling program (ODP) Leg 169S. The ODP cores are missing 1–2 m of water-rich sediment directly underlying the seafloor, but this sediment is preserved in shor...

Continuous coring in Saanich Inlet (Ocean Drilling Program, ODP Leg 169S), British Columbia, Canada, yielded a detailed record of Late Quaternary climate, oceanography, marine productivity, and terrestrial vegetation. Two sites (1033 and 1034) were drilled to maximum depths of 105 and 118 m, recovering sediments ranging in age from 13,300 to less t...

This paper explores the paleoseismic record potentially preserved in the upper 40 m of hydraulic piston cores collected in 1996 at two sites in Saanich Inlet, British Columbia, during ocean drilling program (ODP) Leg 169S. The ODP cores are missing 1-2 m of water-rich sediment directly underlying the seafloor, but this sediment is preserved in shor...

Continuous coring in Saanich Inlet (Ocean Drilling Program, ODP Leg 169S), British Columbia, Canada, yielded a detailed record of Late Quaternary climate, oceanography, marine productivity, and terrestrial vegetation. Two sites (1033 and 1034) were drilled to maximum depths of 105 and 118 m, recovering sediments ranging in age from 13,300 to less t...

Foraminiferal biofacies identified in Saanich Inlet appear to be closely linked to a variety of environmental parameters, including water quality, Five biofacies are defined based on Q-mode cluster analysis and on faunal distribution profiles of foraminifera-bearing surface sediment samples. Biofacies 1 (Eggerella advena Biofacies), which occurs in...

Eight piston cores of sediment spanning the last 1500 years were collected from Saanich Inlet, an anoxic fiord on southern Vancouver Island, to obtain information on sedimentation and prehistoric earthquake activity. The cores consist mainly of fine-grained varved sediments, but include massive layers deposited by subaqueous debris flows. The debri...