The OASYS landslide classification scheme
One of the fundamental aims of R&D projects funded by the European Commission is to foster collaboration. Gathering several different institutions together facilitates the sharing of existing experience and expertise and the creation of new knowledge. The geographic extent of such collaborations is usually confined to the borders of the European Union, but exceptions are made. In the case of the OASYS project and landslide alert systems, a partner was included from China, a country that has suffered from many devastating landslides. An important aspect of managing landslide risk is proper classification of landslides once they have occurred. As there are numerous types of landslide, there is no single approach to classification. The Geological Bureau of China undertook the task of integrating its own classification scheme with that of fellow OASYS partner, the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, and a scheme commonly used in the United States. The resulting OASYS classification scheme is based upon a number of factors. It accounts for the type of underlying rock and topsoil as well as the trigger mechanism (flood, earthquake, etc.) involved. In addition, the type of earth movement is defined as explicitly as possible: fall, slide, creep, topple, spread, flow, represent a few examples. Finally, the results of the landslide are described in detail. The Geological Bureau of China invested considerable effort in order to preserve the optimal components of each of the three original schemes. The OASYS classification scheme was subsequently used to classify a number of landslides at test sites in both China and Europe.
