Submarine Landslide and Risk Evaluation on Its Instability in the Deepwater Continental Margin

Abstract

Abstract:

Submarine landslide is usually a kind of sedimentary process, which includes landslide and debris flow, and can transport sediment over several hundred kilometers. Therefore it leads to large scale slope instability,and makes great threats to deepwater oil platform, pipeline and seafloor cable and so on. Moreover, slope instability can probably cause destructive tsunami. Although various factors can trigger submarine slide, but earthquake and dissolution of gas hydrate have close relationship with formation of submarine slide. With the exploitation of deepwater oil field and the increasing development of abysmal sea project, more and more emphases are laid on the geologic process by people of the academia and industry circles. In this paper, we introduce the slide structure, identification criteria, triggering mechanism of landslide in the deepwater continental margin, and put forward the risk evaluation methods of submarine landslide.

Key words: submarine landslide, triggering mechanism, slope instability, gas hydrate, continental slope

CLC Number:

P736.5

WU Shi-guo, CHEN Shan-shan, WANG Zhi-jun,LI Qing-ping. Submarine Landslide and Risk Evaluation on Its Instability in the Deepwater Continental Margin[J]. Geoscience, 2008, 22(3): 430-437.

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