Submarine landslides offshore Vancouver Island along the northern Cascadia margin, British Columbia: why preconditioning is likely required to trigger slope failure

Bathymetric data reveal abundant submarine landslides along the deformation front of the northern Cascadia margin that might have significant tsunami potential. Radiocarbon age dating showed that slope failures are early to mid-Holocene. The aim of this study is the analysis of slope stability to investigate possible trigger mechanisms using the factor of safety analysis technique on two prominent frontal ridges. First-order values for the earthquake shaking required to generate instability are derived. These are compared to estimated ground accelerations for large (M=5 to 8) crustal earthquakes to giant (M=8 to 9) megathrust events. The results suggest that estimated earthquake accelerations are insufficient to destabilize the slopes, unless the normal sediment frictional resistance is significantly reduced by, for example, excess pore pressure. Elevated pore pressure (overpressure ratio of 0.4) should significantly lower the threshold for earthquake shaking, so that a medium-sized M=5 earthquake at 10 km distance may trigger submarine landslides. Preconditioning of the slopes must be limited primarily to the mid- to early Holocene as slope failures are constrained to this period. The most likely causes for excess pore pressures include rapid sedimentation at the time of glacial retreat, sediment tectonic deformation, and gas hydrate dissociation as result of ocean warming and sea level rise. No slope failures comparable in size and volume have occurred since that time. Megathrust earthquakes have occurred frequently since the most recent failures in the mid-Holocene, which emphasizes the importance of preconditioning for submarine slope stability

Slope failures along the deformation front of the Cascadia margin: linking slide morphology to subduction zone parameters

Marine acoustic data are used to map and characterize submarine slope failure along the accretionary prism of Cascadia. Two main styles of slope failure are identified: (1) failures with curved head scarps, which are predominantly associated with incoherent debris-flow deposits; and (2) failures with rectangular head scarps, which are predominantly associated with intact sediment blocks. Rectangular head scarps mostly occur on thrust ridges with slope angles <16° and ridge heights <650 m, whereas curved head scarps occur predominantly on steeper and higher ridges. Off Vancouver Island, failure style and head-scarp geometry also change with ridge azimuth. We propose that the curved head scarps and debris flows may be a result of higher kinetic forcing of the downsliding sediments and a higher degree of mixing. At the more gently sloped, less elevated ridges, the kinetic forcing may be smaller, which leads to intact failure masses. Extensional faults at ridges with curved scarps may result from oversteepening and collapse of the sediments that cannot withstand their own weight due to limited internal shear strength. The slide geometries and potential controls on failure style may inform subsequent studies in assessing the risks for tsunami generation from submarine slope failures along the Cascadia margin