Friday, February 13, 2009

Landslide in Miri - before and after

13 Feb 09: There was a front page news in this morning See Hua Daily stating that cracks were found on the slope in five different places on the Canada Hill which could pose further landslide if the rain continued.

This was taken this morning. The damaged two houses had been taken down. The bare hill after the landslide at the back is clearly visible. Compare with the picture below which was taken immediately after the initial landslide.



The above picture was taken this morning to show the effect to the hill after multiple landslides. The initial landslide was less massive. Now, the soil that has moved is at least some 20-30 feet deep!
Also, from this morning news, the study team from KL has confirmed that Canada Hill is not suitable for dwelling as the soil is too sandy. As a matter of fact, 20+ years ago, our geologist had pointed this out in one of our local onboarding introductory geology module.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

The thing that irks me the most is that they have to get a team from KL when there are so many geologists in Miri from a certain company!

William said...

Ian, you are absolutely correct. We knew about this all the time. There are more sad news ... another "erosion" to a road going up the hill is apparently caused by irresponsible removal of soil. I need to take some pictures to confirm it.

I Am Sarawakiana said...

Don't forget that many people in Miri had once (quite often at that) been seen stealing soil from the foot of Canada Hill....their excavation although small must have been the initial stages which slowly led to erosion and then soil creep and then the huge mud slide.

Anonymous said...

Aren't the landslides in your country being caused by loggin?

William said...

Anonymous,
Not in this particular case. That hill hardly has big tree. That hill has a history of landslides due to poor soil formation. I think sarawakiana has a point. People excavate soil without using their brain and don't care about consequences.
I personally think that landslide in many other places were due to poor knowledge of soil retention, support, greed and "short-cut".