Erosion Impacting Vegetation and Roads

Observation by Jeffrey Luther:

You can see where vegetation was removed to build the road and landfill. This is making it more vulnerable to fall in prematurely, compared to where the permafrost and vegetation was left alone. Here are some photos of the areas falling in. Turns out that's not a road (photo 5), it's just more debris. There are weak spots where the vegetation was removed and used for the old landfill (photo 6), as you can see they are the accelerated spots falling into the river, vs other places where vegetation was left untouched insulating the permafrost below. These areas withstand falling for longer periods of time.

LEO Says:

This is the latest in a series of observations made by Jeffrey Luther in Noatak. You can follow the story in the related posts or by visiting Jeffery’s profile or the profile for Noatak. Thank you Jeffrey for your keen observations and insights about the ongoing erosion mechanisms and related images. LEO Network is sharing these posts with the community of permafrost scientists in the Permafrost Discovery Gateway and resource agencies. M. Brubaker