📋 Tender Overview
Nepal faces a double whammy of floods and landslides every year. Often considered a secondary hazard landslides are usually triggered by incessant rainfall falling upon hilly and unstable slopes in Nepals predominantly mountainous terrain. As Nepal lies at the cusp of the Indian and Tibetan tectonic plates it is more susceptible to earthquakes and resulting landslides. Unplanned road building and construction along unstable mountain slopes on relatively young mountain terrain compound this problem further.Landslides ravage lives and livelihoods across the mountains and disrupt traffic across snaky mountain roads in-country bringing movement to a standstill and delaying any relief and rehabilitation efforts. In 2022 alone Nepals Disaster Risk Reduction Portal reported 327 landslides across Nepal causing 99 deaths and adversely affecting 992 families 19 people went missing and 88 were injured. Government estimates put economic losses from landslides in 2022 at around NPR 88 million.Despite the damage incurred by landslides each year there is limited information on the Nepals historical landslides land surface characteristics vulnerability and rainfall patterns. Availability and open access to such information can help characterise landslide hazards and risks to decision-making and disaster risk reduction processes.We are looking to plug this information gap by working with NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center GSFC to develop a landslide mapping system and a customisable landslide forecasting system for Nepal.Mapping and forecasting landslidesResearchers at NASA GSFC have been using a multiscale approach to map and forecast landslides at the local regional and global levels. To calculate the relative likelihood of a landslide occurring GSFCs Landslide Hazard Assessment for Situational Awareness LHASA model incorporates global landslide inventories with precipitation data within a machine learning framework. The model provides a near-real-time overview of landslide hazards worldwide and has been tried and tested along the US Pacific Northwest and the Mekong region.We are complementing NASA GSFCs work on landslides towards developing a customisable landslide mapping and forecasting system for Nepal. The system will support the development of a landslide inventory for Nepal to aid decision-making on multiple fronts ranging from hazard zonation to rapid response research. The system will also be able to generate early warnings on high landslide hazard probabilities.Pukar Man Amatya NASA GSFC said The system will forecast landslides using event-based landslide inventories and by taking into consideration antecedent conditions suitable for Nepal and precipitation forecasts generated specifically for the HKH region.Our own High-Impact Weather Assessment Toolkit HIWAT Nepal developed by the NASA SERVIR Applied Sciences Team and further customised for Nepal generates forecasts on rainfall temperature wind hail and lightning strikes during the monsoon period. HIWAT will provide the precipitation forecasts to feed into the LHASA model in the upcoming monsoon.Amatya adds Together with ICIMOD we are consulting landslide experts in Nepal to realise the system.Consultation on a landslide monitoring and forecasting system for NepalIn November 2022 we shared our planned activities and methodology for the system and discussed current needs with relevant stakeholders working on landslide studies and disaster risk reduction in Nepal. Following discussions on the development of a landslide monitoring and forecasting system for the country participants suggested specific approaches to setting up and operationalising the systemFollow the Nepal governments existing technical requirements for better synergies with state province and municipal governments and disaster management and response agencies.Establish a systematic process for identifying tracking and predicting landslides.Work with the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority to establish a steeringtechnical advisory team.Ensure the system uses high-quality parameters including engineering geology geomorphological information and a digital elevation model.Integrate local and international technical information and a thorough understanding of landslide susceptibility parameters.Ensure the system includes a mechanism for end users and beneficiaries to provide feedback.Strategise communication of landslide hazards risks and early warnings.Along with NASA GSFC and local partners we plan to set up a technical advisory team to support the implementation of the system. We will pilot the system in Nepals Karnali Province during the upcoming monsoon where we are already working with partners to establish run and manage a multihazard early warning system.Representatives from the Danish Red Cross Society Department of Hydrology and Meteorology Department of Mines and Geology National Society for Earthquake Technology Nepal Tribhuvan University United States Agency for International Development USAID USAID TAYAR Nepal Youth Innovation Lab and Water Resource Research and Development Centre joined ICIMOD and NASA GSFC officials at the half-day consultation organised at ICIMODs campus in Kathmandu Nepal.
