Scientist Daniel Shugar says images of the aftermath of Thursday's deadly rockslide in Banff National Park provide evidence of its cause — water flowing through the interior of the mountain.
Scientist Daniel Shugar says images of the aftermath of Thursday's deadly rockslide in Banff National Park provide evidence of its cause — water flowing through the interior of the mountain.A helicopter is shown close to the scene of a rock slide near Bow Glacier Falls north of Lake Louise, Alta., in Banff National Park on June 19, 2025.
"That lake has existed since 1955," he said. "So over the last 70 years, the water from this lake glacier retreating has been trying to go downhill through the cracks. It essentially provided the pressure to dislodge the rock."In this segment: A number of people were caught in a rockfall north of Lake Louise yesterday afternoon. Dan Shugar, a geomorphologist - an expert on rockslides - at the University of Calgary joins us to discuss.
Experts agreed that while evidence of previous rockfalls is easy to see, predicting exactly when they will occur is impossible. He said the only thing officials can do is to tell the public about the risks when they enter an area that might be prone to rockfalls.Witnesses reported rumblings and stones moving before a slab of mountain broke loose and rained boulders on hikers below.
John J. Clague, an emeritus professor in Earth sciences at Simon Fraser University, said that when he looks at the Banff and Jasper landscapes, he sees lots of cones marking where rockfalls have occurred in the past. "There's a lot of randomness and chaos in events like a rock slide, so the conditions were perhaps favourable to it, but that it happened was simply bad luck," he said.
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'Randomness and chaos': Predicting deadly rockfall impossible, say scientistsScientist Daniel Shugar says images of the aftermath of Thursday's deadly rockslide in Banff National Park provide evidence of its cause — water flowing through the interior of the mountain.
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'Randomness and chaos': Predicting deadly rockfall impossible, say scientistsScientist Daniel Shugar says images of the aftermath of Thursday's deadly rockslide in Banff National Park provide evidence of its cause — water flowing through the interior of the mountain.
Read more »
'Randomness and chaos': The invisible, unpredictable forces behind fatal rockfallScientist Daniel Shugar says images of the aftermath of Thursday's deadly rockslide in Banff National Park provide evidence of its cause — water flowing through the interior of the mountain.
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'Randomness and chaos': The invisible, unpredictable forces behind fatal rockfallScientist Daniel Shugar says images of the aftermath of Thursday's deadly rockslide in Banff National Park provide evidence of its cause — water flowing through the interior of the mountain.
Read more »
‘Randomness and chaos’: The invisible, unpredictable forces behind fatal rockfallScientist Daniel Shugar says images of the aftermath of Thursday's deadly rockslide in Banff National Park provide evidence of its cause
Read more »
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