Landslide Watch Aotearoa: Space-based approach to detect and forecast ground deformation

The aims of this research programme are broadly to use satellite data (InSAR) to detect slow-moving landslides, link their movement patterns to the climatic drivers and characterise their behaviour before they cause damaging and/or catastrophic impacts.

In New Zealand, many landslides are pre-existing, large, deep, slow-moving and persist for generations; they damage homes, infrastructure and sometimes accelerate to fail catastrophically. Forecasting when a landslide might transition from slow to fast depends on our ability to identify the movement, constrain its mechanism, and model that movement under different driving conditions.