Owen Ridge deep-water submarine landslides: implications for tsunami hazard along the Oman coast

Mathieu Rodriguez (1) , Nicolas Chamot-Rooke (2) , Hélène Hébert (3) , Marc Fournier (1) , Philippe Huchon (1)

1 iSTeP - Institut des Sciences de la Terre de Paris
2 LGENS - Laboratoire de géologie de l'ENS
3 DAM/DIF - DAM Île-de-France

The recent discovery of voluminous submarine landslides along the Owen Ridge may represent a source of tsunami hazard for the nearby Oman coast. We as- sess the severity of this potential hazard by performing numerical simulations of tsunami generation and propaga- tion from the biggest landslide (40km3 in volume) ob- served along the Owen Ridge. A finite-difference model, assimilating the landslide to a visco-plastic flow, simulates tsunami generation. Computation results show that Salalah city(190000inhabitants)isimpactedby2.5m-hightsunami waves one hour after sediment failure. Higher wave eleva- tion values (4 m) are reached in the low populated Sawqara Bay over 80 min after slide initiation. Although large subma- rine failures along remote oceanic ridges are infrequent, this study reveals an underestimated source of tsunami hazard in theArabianSea.

Domaines: Sciences de la Terre

Mathieu Rodriguez, Nicolas Chamot-Rooke, Hélène Hébert, Marc Fournier, Philippe Huchon. Owen Ridge deep-water submarine landslides: implications for tsunami hazard along the Oman coast. Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences, 2013, 13, pp.417-424. ⟨10.5194/nhess-13-417-2013⟩. ⟨hal-00788903⟩