the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
An integrated, replicable Landslide Early Warning System for informal settlements – case study in Medellín, Colombia
John Singer
Carolina Garcia-Londoño
Lisa Seiler
Julian Castañeda
David Cerón-Hernandez
Kurosch Thuro
Abstract. Due to climate change and growing urbanization, fatalities from landslides are rising worldwide, and thus solutions for people at risk are needed. This is especially the case for the Andean cities which are often expanding into the steep slopes surrounding them. In Medellín, Colombia, a combination of landslide-prone dunite rock and steep slopes in the east of the city creates a high-hazard scenario for about 87,000 residents, most of whom live in informal settlements. We developed a landslide early warning system (LEWS) which can be applied in such semi-urban situations. The LEWS consists mainly of a measurement system of horizontal and vertical sensor lines across the slope and autonomous point-sensors in between these lines. All parts of the LEWS, from hazard assessment to the monitoring system and the reaction capacity, are supported by extensive activities together with the local community to gain trust and create synergies. This also includes local authorities, agencies and NGO's. To test such a system, a prototype has been installed in a neighborhood in Medellín in 2020–2022. The experiences of this installation resulted in a framework for LEWS's of this kind which we have compiled on a wiki-page to facilitate replication by people in other parts of the world. Hopefully, this can stimulate a lively exchange between researchers and other stakeholders who want to use, modify and replicate our system.
Moritz Gamperl et al.
Status: open (until 03 Apr 2023)
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RC1: 'Comment on nhess-2023-20', Anonymous Referee #1, 17 Mar 2023
reply
The paper presents an important issue regarding the rising fatalities from landslides due to climate change and urbanization, and the need for solutions for people at risk, in Andean cities such as Medellín. The authors propose a landslide early warning system (LEWS) which has been developed and tested in a neighborhood in Medellín, and a framework for LEWSs has been set.
The paper lacks details on the technical aspects of the system and its effectiveness in reducing fatalities. The rainfall/velocity thresholds are not even set yet. The paper also does not provide a thorough evaluation of the system's performance during the testing phase. Lastly, the manuscript seems to have a report-like structure, not really suitable for a research paper.
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-2023-20-RC1 -
RC2: 'Comment on nhess-2023-20', Anonymous Referee #2, 21 Mar 2023
reply
In the paper “An integrated, replicable Landslide Early Warning System for informal settlements - case study in Medellin, Colombia” the authors describe an example of participatory, replicable landslide early warning system (LEWS), which was installed in Medellín (Colombia). The peculiarity of the LEWS is to combine the technological (measurement of physical parameters through a network of low-cost sensors) and social aspect (contribution of the involved stakeholders), in view of improving the system efficiency through a participatory approach. The case study is certainly interesting and promising but, in my opinion, the manuscript cannot be considered for publication as an original research paper. In detail, at the end of section 1.3 the authors assert that: “the scope of this contribution is to expand the concepts for a monitoring system as published in Singer et al. (2021); Gamperl et al. (2021b) and show them in the larger picture of the whole LEWS, including also the social angle”. However, the current structure of the work does not help in clarifying the novelty of the work. To be honest, the article has a very conversational tone, but great part of the reported information has been already published in the two above-mentioned articles, and only few, new things (i.e., Inform@Risk wiki, community and social integration of LEWS) have been added, which are not sufficient to significantly improve the scientific quality of the article. For instance, section 3 just describes the installation of the monitoring system in Medellín which, in turn, is a replication (with few modifications) of that installed in southern Germany and already described in Gamperl et al., 2021b.
At the beginning of Section 5.1, the authors assert that: “Detailed investigations of the data produced by the system and their analysis and interpretation are out of scope for this publication and will be published in the future”. Well, my suggestion is to focus on this specific issue instead, since I am convinced that the significance and reliability of the entire LEWS will benefit from it.Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-2023-20-RC2
Moritz Gamperl et al.
Moritz Gamperl et al.
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