Glacier and snow avalanche studies in Uzbekistan based on TanDEM-X, TerraSAR-X and PAZ SAR data

Abstract

The mountain and foothill regions of the Republic of Uzbekistan occupy about 12% of the country’s territory. They are located in the East and South-East (Western Tien-Shan and Hissar-Alay mountains). Outstanding progress in the republic’s economic development predetermines the future active development of Uzbekistan’s mountain territories including tourism, roadbuilding and electric power line construction. The infrastructure development and recreational activities in the mountains can be threatened by avalanches and debris flow occurrence. The relevance of solving the scientific and practical tasks in studies of glaciers and snow avalanches is due to the need for current assessments of climate changes in the region, the impact on hydrological regime in glacierized basins, and timely protection in snow-avalanche prone areas and in the case of GLOF. Using TanDEM-X bistatic data, as well as the global TDM-DEM and SRTM-based NASADEM, geodetic mass balances were estimated for glaciers located in the upper part of the Pskem River basin for recent decades. However, the SAR data over the relatively small glaciers and the complex topography are largely affected by layover and shadow. For the present work recent bistatic TanDEM-X SAR acquisitions with different orbit direction configuration will be processed aiming at reducing the DEM gaps on the glaciers. The potential of interferometric SAR data pairs of the TerraSAR-X/PAZ constellation for deriving glacier movement and snow avalanche maps will be evaluated. The detection of avalanche paths and identification of the avalanche depositions in well-studied areas of Uzbekistan using SAR backscatter signatures and numerical simulations will be investigated.