Landslide Photo Collections

Searchable USGS Photo and Multimedia Archive with Ordering Information

  • In July 1949, the M=7.4 Khait earthquake triggered many hundreds of landslides in a mountainous region near the southern limit of the Tien Shan Mountains, central Tajikistan. This photo shows a view of the Khait rockslide-loess flow triggered by the M=7.4 1949 Khait earthquake. The scar of the source rockslide is visible on Chokrak Mountain (vertical arrow). The rockslide-loess flow buried the settlements of Khait and Khisorak located on opposite banks of the Obi-Kabud River. (Photograph taken in October 2006, taken by Steven Evans, University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada).
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  • Source area of the 1949 Khait landslide on Chokrak Mountain. Photograph by Steve Evans, Univerity of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
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  • View downstream of path of the Khait rockslide-loess flow. Steep slope in middle-right foreground marks the scarp of the remobilized rockslide debris that, combined with loess from the valley bottom and valley side, formed the high-velocity flow that buried Khait, 3.5 km downstream. Photograph by Steve Evans, University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
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  • View (to the southwest) of Yasman valley loess flow deposit, forming the slightly raised surface of the floor of the Yasman valley. The flow formed when hundreds of individual loess flowslides, triggered by the M=7.4 1949 Khait earthquake on the steep mountain slopes visible in the background, coalesced to form a massive loess flow in the main Yasman valley. Photograph taken in October 2006 by Steve Evans, University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
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