In late September 2017, intense precipitation associated with Hurricane Maria caused extensive landsliding across Puerto Rico. Much of the Lares municipality in central-western Puerto Rico was severely impacted by landslides., Landslide density in this region was mapped as greater than 25 landslides/km2 (Bessette-Kirton et al., 2019). In order to better understand the controlling variables of landslide occurrence and runout in this region, three 2.5-km2 study areas were selected and all landslides within were mapped in detail using remote-sensing data. Included in the data release are five separate shapefiles: geographic areas representing the mapping extent of the four distinct areas (map areas, filename: map_areas), initiation location polygons (source areas, filename: SourceArea), polygons of the entire impacted area consisting of source, transport, and deposition (affected areas, filename: AffectArea), points on the furthest upslope extent of the landslide source areas (headscarp point, filename: HSPoint), and lines reflecting the approximate travel paths from the furthest upslope extent to the furthest downslope extent of the landslides (runout lines, filename: RunoutLine). These shapefiles contain a number of attributes, some subjective (including general geomorphic setting and impact of human activity), some geometric (including length, width, and depth), and others on the underlying geology and soil of the landslides. A table detailing each attribute, attribute abbreviations, the possible choices for each attribute, and a short description of each attribute is provided as a table in the file labeled AttributeDescription.docx. The headscarp point shapefile attribute tables contain closest distance between headscarp and paved road (road_d_m; road data from U.S. Census Bureau, 2015). The runout line shapefile attribute table reflects if the landslide was considered independently unmappable past a road or river (term_drain), the horizontal length of the runout (length_m), the fall height from the headscarp to termination (h_m), the ratio of fall height to runout length (hlratio), distance to nearest paved road (road_d_m), and the watershed area upslope from the upper end of the runout line (wtrshd_m2). All quantitative metrics were calculated using tools available in ESRI ArcMap v. 10.6. The source area shapefile attribute table reflects general source area vegetation (vegetat) and land use (land_use), whether the slide significantly disaggregated during movement (flow), the failure mode (failmode), if the slide was a reactivation of a previous one (reactivate), if the landslide directly impacted the occurrence of another slide (ls_complex), the proportion of source material that left the source area (sourc_evac), the state of the remaining material (remaining), the curvature of the source area (sourc_curv), potential human impact on landslide occurrence (human_caus), potential landslide impact on human society (human_effc), if a building exists within 10 meters of the source area (buildng10m), if a road exists within 50 meters of the source area (road50m), the planimetric area of the source area (area_m2), the dimension of the source area perpendicular to the direction of motion (width_m), the dimension of the source area parallel to the direction of motion (length_m), the geologic formation of the source area (FMATN; from Bawiec, W.J., 1998), the soil type of the source area (MUNAME; from Acevido, G., 2020), the root-zone (0-100 cm deep) soil moisture estimated by the NASA SMAP mission for 9:30 am Atlantic Standard Time on 21 September 2017 (the day after Hurricane María) (smap; NASA, 2017), the average precipitation amount in the source area for the duration of the hurricane (pptn_mm; from Ramos-Scharrón, C.E., and Arima, E., 2019), the source area mean slope (mn_slp_d), the source area median slope (mdn_slp_d), the average depth change of material from the source area after the landslide (mn_dpth_m), the median depth change of material from the source area after the landslide (mdn_dpt_m), the sum of the volumetric change of material in the source area after the landslide (ldr_sm_m3), the major geomorphic landform of the source (maj_ldfrm), and the landcover of the source area (PRGAP_CL; from Homer, C. C. Huang, L. Yang, B. Wylie and M. Coan, 2004). The affected area shapefile attribute table reflects the general affected area vegetation type (vegetat), the major geomorphic landform on which the landslide occurred (maj_ldfrm), whether the slide disaggregated during movement (flow), the general land use (land_use), the planimetric area of the affected area (area_m2), the dominant geologic formation of the affected area (FMATN; from Bawiec, W.J., 1998), the dominant soil type of the affected area (MUNAME; from Acevido, G., 2020), the sum of the volumetric change of material in all the contributing source areas for the affected area (Sum_ldr_sm), the average volumetric change of material in all the contributing source areas for the affected area (Avg_ldr_sm), if the landslide was considered independently unmappable past a road or river (term_drain), the number of contributing source areas to the affected area (num_srce), and the dominant landcover of the affected area (PRGAP_CL; from Homer, C. C. Huang, L. Yang, B. Wylie and M. Coan, 2004). Mapping was conducted using aerial imagery collected between 9-15 October 2017 at 25-cm resolution (Quantum Spatial, Inc., 2017), a 1-m-resolution pre-event lidar digital elevation model (DEM) (U.S. Geological Survey, 2018), and a 1-m-resolution post-event lidar DEM (U.S. Geological Survey, 2020). In order to accurately determine the extent of the mapped landslides and to verify the georeferencing of the aerial imagery, aerial photographs were overlain with each DEM as well as a pre- and post-event lidar difference (2016-2018), and corrections were made as needed. Additional data sources described in the AttributeDescription document and metadata were used to extract spatial data once mapping was complete and results were appended to the shapefile attribute tables. Data in this release are provided as ArcGIS point (HSPoint), line (RunoutLine), and polygon (AffectArea and SourceArea) feature class files. Bessette-Kirton, E.K., Cerovski-Darriau, C., Schulz, W.H., Coe, J.A., Kean, J.W., Godt, J.W, Thomas, M.A., and Hughes, K. Stephen, 2019, Landslides Triggered by Hurricane Maria: Assessment of an Extreme Event in Puerto Rico: GSA Today, v. 29, doi:10.1130/GSATG383A.1
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Bawiec, W.J., 1998, Geology, geochemistry, geophysics, mineral occurrences and mineral resource assessment for the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 98-38, https://pubs.usgs.gov/of/1998/of98-038/ (accessed May 2020).
Acevido, G., 2020, Soil Survey of Arecibo Area of Norther Puerto Rico: United States Department of Agriculture, Soil Conservation Service.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration [NASA], 2017, SMAP L4 Global 3-hourly 9 km EASE-Grid Surface and Root Zone Soil Moisture Analysis Update, Version 4: National Snow & Ice Data Center web page, accessed September 12, 2019, at https://nsidc.org/data/SPL4SMAU/versions/4.
Ramos-Scharrón, C.E., and Arima, E., 2019, Hurricane María’s precipitation signature in Puerto Rico—A conceivable presage of rains to come: Scientific Reports, v. 9, no. 1, article no. 15612, accessed February 28, 2020, at https://doi.org/10.1038/ s41598-019-52198-2.
Homer, C. C. Huang, L. Yang, B. Wylie and M. Coan, 2004, Development of a 2001 National Landcover Database for the United States: Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing, Vol. 70, No. 7, July 2004, pp. 829-840.
Quantum Spatial, Inc., 2017, FEMA PR Imagery: https://s3.amazonaws.com/fema-cap-imagery/Others/Maria (accessed October 2017).
U.S. Geological Survey, 2018, USGS NED Original Product Resolution PR Puerto Rico 2015: http://nationalmap.gov/elevation.html (accessed October 2018).
U.S. Geological Survey, 2020, USGS NED Original Product Resolution PR Puerto Rico 2018: http://nationalmap.gov/elevation.html (accessed June 2020).
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