The term landslide comes from the Latin word delābi, which can be translated as “slide”. The concept, which can also be referred to as landslide, refers to the crumbling or falling of land as a result of the action of a water current. See Abbreviation Finder for acronyms related to Landslide.
The landslide, therefore, is linked to the erosion generated by the water on a bank and to the effect of the force of gravity. It can also be a landslide that is caused by rain when the water causes the separation of a layer of earth from the bedrock.
Other names by which the landslide is known are landslide and landslide, and it is a disaster that is linked to avalanches; however, instead of a snow slide, the mudslide carries rocks, dirt, trees, and ruined buildings, among other objects.
Sometimes the landslide is almost imperceptible, since the land barely moves a few centimeters. In other cases, however, the landslide can be very fast, with movements of more than 30 kilometers per hour. When a landslide of many tons of land occurs very quickly, it is possible to generate a tragedy since entire villages can be buried.
The reasons why a landslide can occur are several, and cover both natural and human-caused issues; for example, it can occur as a result of instability around the area, due to earthquakes or the eruption of a volcano, but also as a result of an explosion in the context of a construction site.
Specifically, landslides take place when water enters between different layers of soil. These layers are linked by friction, which exerts a resistance to slipping. The water, by removing this force, therefore causes the land to slide. That is why intense precipitation, the growth of groundwater, melting ice and erosion produced by a stream can lead to a landslide.
The landslide is, ultimately, a landslide: a mass of land (considered unstable) moves over another (known as stable) by means of a thin surface. For the landslide to occur, the tangential stress of the strips of land must reach its maximum value at each of its points. It is known by the name of tangential or shear stress that acts tangent to a given plane.
Some landslides consist of mud slides; these flows occur above all in areas with frequent rains and usually cover considerable surfaces. When a clay soil comes into contact with water, it acts in a similar way to when it reaches the liquid limit (the percentage of water that the dry soil contains and that defines the transition between its liquid and plastic states; the least amount of moisture for a soil flows by vibration) and its movement is slower than that of a slide.
Mud runoff occurs on small slopes, but the volume is often considerable. Its repercussion in the zone of influence depends on the stratigraphic characteristics of the site where the phenomenon takes place (the arrangement of its sedimentary rocks), something that also affects the thickness of the slide.
In short, there are morphological and geological causes that cause landslides, while human activity can also affect them. Although they cannot be avoided since they respond to physical forces, their damage can be prevented or minimized through engineering works. Landslides related to the rainy season are very regular in certain parts of the world, such as the state of California, in North America.
