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Measurement of crack‐face friction in collapsed weak snow layers
Open accessAbstract
In this letter we analyze the frictional contact forces during and immediately after the collapse of a weak snowpack layer, when the sliding plane consists of the freshly collapsed and crushed, but not yet eroded granular debris of the weak layer. The results from thirty‐four field experiments show that frictional contact forces per unit area are on the order of 0.6 times the normal stress, equivalent to a friction angle close to 30 degrees. The measurements show that there is a transient, sharp drop in the coefficient of friction during the collapse of the weak layer and relatively constant values afterwards. One implication of our findings is that the minimum angle for avalanche release does not depend on shear strength, as commonly thought, but results from crack‐face friction which comes into play only as the fracture through the weak layer is already propagating.
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Buried crystals of depth hoar reported on the site tend to exhibit rather low friction values.
“the buried crystals of depth hoar, which were reported by the investigation on the site (see Supplementary Note 3), tend to exhibit rather low friction values 13”
From Mechanisms of slab avalanche release and impact in the Dyatlov Pass incident in 1959 (2021) · cites this paper as [13]
The Discussion and Conclusion (§4, paragraph 16; page unavailable) says crack-face friction in collapsed weak layers is far from negligible and that the measured friction showed no dependence on weak-layer grain type. The Results (§3, paragraph 14) describe depth hoar as porous and low in cohesion, not low in friction. The paper therefore does not support singling out depth-hoar crystals as tending to have low friction. (LLM, conf=0.84)
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Research works printed but not linked: 19
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Cited by
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Mechanisms of slab avalanche release and impact in the Dyatlov Pass incident in 1959
Gaume, J., & Puzrin, A. M. (2021) · Communications Earth & Environment · doi:10.1038/s43247-020-00081-8 · Cited by 12
Metadata
- Authors
- van Herwijnen, A., & Heierli, J.
- Affiliations
- WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research SLF (CH)
- Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (DE)
- Venue
- Geophysical Research Letters
- Publisher
- American Geophysical Union (AGU)
- Published
- 2009-12
- Volume
- 36
- Issue
- 23
- ISSN
- 0094-8276 (ISSN-L)
- 1944-8007
- OpenAlex
- W2023348588
- Cited by
- 73
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 3 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 1 · 2018: 4 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 4 · 2015: 7 · 2014: 7 · 2013: 7 · 2012: 6
- FWCI
- 17.79
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.dora.lib4ri.ch
- Licence
- Locations
- Geophysical Research Letters (publishedVersion)
- DORA WSL (Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Funders
- University of Calgary
- European Commission
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law › Landslides and related hazards
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Atmospheric Science › Cryospheric studies and observations
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Forestry › Tree Root and Stability Studies
- Keywords
- crack face friction, weak snow layers, friction coefficient, internal friction angle, avalanche release, shear strength
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