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  • RESEARCH HIGHLIGHT

The violent blasts that can add to an avalanche’s devastation

Scientists zero in on the factors that heighten the chance of ‘airblasts’ after a slope collapses.
Scenic Yumthang valley with view of river Teesta and majestic Himalayan range.

A 2015 rock avalanche in the Yumthang Valley, located in the eastern Himalayan range, triggered a blast of air that knocked down more than 1,000 trees. Credit: Shutterstock

Rock falls and rock avalanches, which are dangerous enough in their own right, sometimes unleash an additional peril: powerful blasts of air that can flatten trees more than a kilometre away. Now scientists have documented the conditions that make these ‘airblasts’ more likely.

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Nature 585, 163 (2020)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-02514-y

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