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Inventory of Large Slope Instabilities, Prince William Sound, Alaska

Metadata Updated: November 13, 2025

Steep glacial and paraglacial landscapes often exhibit evidence of gravitationally-driven slope deformation. In recently deglaciated coastal environments, catastrophic failures of these bedrock instabilities as rapid landslides have the potential to generate tsunamis that may pose hazards for communities, infrastructure, mariners, and important natural and cultural resources. We present a first inventory of manually mapped bedrock instabilities in western Prince William Sound and nearby locations in the Chugach Mountains. Slope instabilities included in this inventory are defined as large areas (> 0.01 km2) that exhibit evidence of slope deformation, including scarps, tension cracks, and signs of recent smaller-scale landslides. Areas of repeat rock avalanches, that may indicate areas of larger deformation, are also included. All instabilities in this inventory were identified from a combination of field observations, satellite and airborne optical imagery, InSAR (interferometric synthetic aperture radar)-derived elevation models, and limited local lidar elevation models. This inventory is not exhaustive or complete, nor should it be considered a statistically representative sample of instabilities in this region. Furthermore, it is our intention to continue to add records to this inventory as previously unidentified instabilities are discovered or develop in changing conditions. The data presented here represent bedrock instabilities in western Prince William Sound identified prior to February 2023.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date September 14, 2025
Metadata Updated Date November 13, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from DOI USGS DCAT-US

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date September 14, 2025
Metadata Updated Date November 13, 2025
Publisher U.S. Geological Survey
Maintainer
Identifier http://datainventory.doi.gov/id/dataset/usgs-642735b7d34e370832ff6708
Data Last Modified 2025-03-10T00:00:00Z
Category geospatial
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 010:12
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Metadata Catalog ID https://ddi.doi.gov/usgs-data.json
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id d8caace6-8c64-42d2-828b-c3c40f57c620
Harvest Source Id 2b80d118-ab3a-48ba-bd93-996bbacefac2
Harvest Source Title DOI USGS DCAT-US
Metadata Type geospatial
Old Spatial -149.6250, 60.5000, -147.3750, 61.5000
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash f4ab5d71d08e92c6cfaa783d8d42584157b6ddf18b0fdbf6265ac57bf42e9eb0
Source Schema Version 1.1
Spatial {"type": "Polygon", "coordinates": -149.6250, 60.5000, -149.6250, 61.5000, -147.3750, 61.5000, -147.3750, 60.5000, -149.6250, 60.5000}

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