Glacier-Related Hazards and Their Assessment in the Tajik Pamir: A Short Review.

Abstract

This paper reviews contemporary glacial features, characteristics of documented glacial hazards, and the status of hazard assessment studies in the Pamirs of Tajikistan (hereafter the Tajik Pamir). The review found detachment of a hanging glacier, glacier-surging, and outburst discharge of a glacial lake to be major potential causes of glacial hazards in the Tajik Pamir, especially in the western area (west from approx. 73° E). Guerrilla glacial lakes, which are characterised as glacial lakes on the ice-core moraine that "appear repeatedly," "enlarge rapidly (within less than one year)," "disappear within less than two years," "are superficially closed," and "are of relatively small size (approx. < 10 6 m 2)" should hereafter be paid special attentions. Preparation of appropriate hazard-mitigation activities should require early detection of not only the large crack in the hanging-glacier terminus, surge behaviour, and the glacial lake and guerrilla glacial lake, but also regular monitoring of these hazard factors. One of the most suitable monitoring techniques is to use earth observation satellite images with a relatively short repetitive cycle (ideally once every few days) and a high spatial resolution (ideally several meters). These criteria may be satisfied in the near future by using images captured by many sets of microsatel-lites, such as the 50-kg class microsatellite SPRITE-SAT (RISING).