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A gravity survey was conducted in Guinsaugon, St. Bernard, Southern Leyte, Philippines, to determine the subsurface structure of the Leyte segment of the Philippine Fault Zone (PFZ), where a massive landslide killed 1119 villagers on 17 February 2006. The landslide started on top of a 780-m-high ridge linked with the PFZ. The build-up of pore pressure in the slope due to saturation and possible earthquake-triggered ground shaking along the PFZ, may have initiated the landslide. A two-dimensional structure using homogeneous density models was applied to interpret the gravity anomalies in the Guinsaugon landslide. The most suitable model depicts a deep, narrow graben filled with low-density sediments. The graben is 1.5 km wide and 2 km deep and has a density contrast of -0.4 g/cm3. The western boundary of the graben is steep and coincides with the terminus (southern) Leyte segment of the PFZ. The existence of a deep-seated seismically active fault at the foot of the steep slopes and the soft sediments in the narrow graben are important factors in understanding the trigger and failure mechanisms of the landslide and in the assessment of hazards and risks due to landslides and earthquakes.

Abstract: On 17 February 2006, a rockslide-debris avalanche cascaded down the steep slope of Mt. Can-abag, burying the entire village of Guinsaugon in St. Bernard, Southern Leyte, Philippines. Casualties include 139 dead with 980 still missing and presumed dead, making it perhaps the most catastrophic landslide in Philippine history. The landslide started at the ridge top along a fault plane associated with the active Philippine Fault Zone. It started as a block slide that transformed into an avalanche. The entire event lasted for only a few minutes. Estimated maximum landslide velocity is 120–130 m/s. The landslide left behind a deep, wedge-shaped scarp. The central part of the deposit exhibits a hummocky topography typical of avalanches, in contrast to the flatter surface of the debris-flow-type marginal deposit. High amounts of soil in the matrix were derived from the scouring of ancient landslide deposits and rice fields in the valley. The landslide has a total area of 3.2 km2 and a runout distance of 4.1 km. Estimated volume of debris is approximately 20 Mm3. At least four streams were dammed by the landslide debris. Intense precipitation and earthquakes preceding the landslide are the potential triggers. Preliminary back analyses assuming a planar and wedge slip surface yielded very low factors of safety even under dry conditions. A more rigorous analysis of the failure mechanism of the landslide is needed.

Abstract The June 15, 1991 climactic eruption of Mt. Pinatubo produced an extensive, largely co-ignimbrite-derived airfall ash layer on Luzon Island and across the central South China Sea. The layer covers an area of ~4×105 km2 with a volume of 5.5 km3. Near the coast of Luzon, the deposit consists of two units: a normally graded basal ash bed, unimodal in grain size, and a finer-grained, internally structureless upper ash bed showing grain size bimodality. With increasing distance from the source, the coarse particle populations of the two units merge and migrate towards a near-constant fine population (~11 µm); the distal region is covered by a fine-mode dominated, virtually ungraded single ash layer. The reversal of the winds from easterly directions at upper-tropospheric and stratospheric levels to westerly directions in the middle and lower troposphere indicates that both the coarse- and fine-mode components fell out from high-altitude eruption clouds. The high-velocity upper-level winds, however, would have transported fine-grained ash particles far beyond the South China Sea, which suggests that their settling was accelerated by aggregation. The boundary between the units thus marks a change from fallout of predominantly discrete pyroclasts to simultaneous fallout of aggregated fines and freely falling, coarse-grained particles. The particle populations composing the upper ash bed were almost completely removed from the proximal areas by the upper-level winds. At lower elevations, the counterclockwise circulation of a typhoon over the coastal area advected the ash south and eastward, producing a thickness maximum in the medial region (at about 160 km from source). The strong displacement of fines, possibly aided by wind turbulence, led to a break in bulk tephra thinning rates close to the coastline. In the distal region, outside the influence of the typhoon, southwest monsoonal winds caused a distinct lobe axis inflection and thickness asymmetry. Within this region, at about 420 km from source, fallout of particle aggregates created a second thickness maximum. Comparison of the field data with previous experimental observations and tephra flux records in the deep sea (Wiesner et al. 1995; Carey 1997; McCool 2002) implies that the transport of ash in the water column was largely determined by vertical density currents. Differences in the reaction of coarse and fine particles to turbulence in the descending plumes probably suppressed the segregation of fines but allowed the coarser pyroclasts to maintain their initial order of arrival at the sea surface. Considering typical fall rates of convective plumes, modifications of the initial fallout position of the particles by the South China Sea current system are on the order of only a few kilometers. The results suggest that convective sedimentation processes ensure the preservation of atmospheric particle transport directions, distances, and fallout modes in the deep sea.