UAE Scientists Pioneer Vital Research to Prevent Devastating Floods in Nepal

Abu Dhabi scientists are working to understand where threats from landslides or glacial collapses may emerge in Nepal as part of research that could save lives. Their work may offer an early warning to communities at risk from floods prompted by landslides and glacier falls of the kind that last month killed more than 1,300 people and left thousands more missing.

Prof Mohammed Ali and Dr Aisha Al Suwaidi of the department of earth sciences at Khalifa University in Abu Dhabi are organising the project, which was set up before the recent tragedy, alongside University of Oxford researcher, Prof Mike Searle.

“If the work helps provide even a few additional minutes of warning, prevents unsafe development in a flood corridor, or improves understanding of where the next hazard may emerge, it will have considerable value,” Dr Al Suwaidi said.

Among the lessons that can be learnt from the recent disaster, the researchers said, is that events in a remote and sparsely populated location “can become a catastrophe much farther downstream”. “Hazard assessment, therefore, has to follow the entire river system rather than stop at the glacier or national border,” Dr Al Suwaidi added.

The work is part of the Emirates Polar Programme, a research project looking at how the polar regions are being affected by climate change. The Himalayas are part of a region sometimes referred to as the third pole. There is concern among scientists that the retreat of glaciers and the thawing of permafrost as a result of climate change will make landslides, glacial collapse and floods more likely.

The scientists from Khalifa University are not the only people from the UAE working to help those in Nepal affected by the flooding tragedy. A UAE Search and Rescue team, working alongside Nepali personnel, have brought the total number of people recovered to 18 since their arrival in the country on September 4. At least 1,385 have been killed in the floods, Nepal's National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority said in its latest report.

Before the disaster in Nepal, the scientists had started developing their research programme, planning field activities and recruiting researchers, including postgraduate students. The work, to run over several years, will look at the region’s climate, changes to the cryosphere, outburst floods from glacial lakes and tectonics.

Early on, the researchers will analyse historical satellite observations to understand how the landscape has changed. There will be repeated visits to the area, laboratory analysis and sustained observation of certain glaciers, slopes, lakes and rivers.

“The programme brings together modern hazard monitoring and the geological reconstruction of past events,” Prof Ali said. Across the Himalayas in Nepal, glaciers, glacial lakes, snow cover, rivers, unstable slopes and landslide deposits will be mapped repeatedly using optical and radar satellites.

As part of the new UAE research project, the scientists, with partners in Nepal, will select the most at-risk glaciers in need of detailed observations. They will look for accelerated movement of ice, the development of fractures, changes in the levels of lakes, meltwater production and river discharge.

“Our goals are both scientific and practical,” Prof Ali said. “Ultimately, success would mean converting scientific observations into usable information: better maps, better monitoring, stronger local expertise, more effective warnings, and safer decisions about where and how infrastructure and communities are developed.”

The researchers also noted a direct physical connection between their research area and the Arabian Peninsula, noting that long-distance dust transport contributes to the darkening and melting of high-altitude snow in high-mountain Asia. Prof Searle emphasised that understanding the whole Himalaya ecosystem is vital to reducing disaster risks for more than one billion people who depend on water from the region.