Integrating Modelling, Visualization and Regional Collaboration for multi-hazard risks in the Hindu Kush Himalayas

Agenda

Background:

The Hindu Kush Himalaya (HKH) region, also referred to as the “Third Pole”, is a vast and ecologically diverse area extending over 3500 km from Afghanistan in the west to Myanmar in the east. This region passes through Pakistan, India, China, Nepal, Bhutan, and Bangladesh. This region consists of significant snow cover, spanning more than 760,000 km² (18% of total HKH region) and holding ice reserve equivalent to 6100 km³, outside the polar regions. The HKH is major water source for 10 major Asian river systems and supports more than 3 billion population in these river basins. The HKH contains four out of 36 global diversity hotspots and home to 270 million people who directly depend on its resources for their livelihood. HKH has rich cultural diversity and over 1000 languages are spoken across the region.

Despite its ecological and cultural health, the HKH region is highly vulnerable to multiple natural hazards and their interactions. Over the past two decades, the HKH has undergone rapid and extensive changes, with impacts projected to worsen due to climate change and other anthropogenic factors. This region has different geographies and is prone to multiple hazards such as earthquake, GLOFs, Permafrost thawing, landslides, flood/flash floods, drought, heatwaves/cold waves, thunderbolts, windstorms, and forest fires. These multiple hazards also occur together leading to multi-hazard interaction scenarios such as the Cascading Melamchi flood June 2021, Cascading Chamoli flood 2021, intensive forest fires after a long dry/drought period, landslides triggered by earthquakes, dam break flooding triggered by earthquakes etc. These events highlight the region’s susceptibility to multi-hazard risks, where the interactions between different hazards can amplify the disaster risks, posing severe impacts to the vulnerable populations in the HKH region. This suggests that the HKH region should be prepared to deal with the repeatedly occurring cascading, compounding, and amplifying impacts of the multi-hazard events.

To visualize the above-mentioned hazards and their interactions within the HKH region, ICIMOD’s Action Area A: Managing Cryosphere and Water Risks under Strategic Group 1: Reducing Climate and Environmental Risks has recently drafted an MHRA framework and plan to develop it for different geographies of the HKH region. This framework identifies the potential hazards and the hazards interactions within the given HKH region. It also suggests possible multi-hazard modelling methods, population, and infrastructure vulnerability assessment and finally the multi-hazard risk assessment. To further validate the designed framework and provide proof of concept to this framework, the ICIMOD team under Action Area A and Strategic Group 1 is organising the MHRA workshop by bringing together technical experts from various fields to develop and refine this framework. In addition, the workshop aims to highlight the existing technical gaps through expert consultation and update the MHRA framework based on expert discussions and a multi-hazard modelling hackathon.

Objectives:

The objectives of this workshop will be to:

1. Collaborate for multi-hazard modelling by providing an opportunity for modelling experts from ICIMOD Regional Member Countries (RMCs) to brainstorm, innovate and co-develop methodologies for MHRA in the HKH region.
2. Engage participants in identifying key challenges in current multi-hazard modelling practices and encourage collaborative problem-solving to overcome these challenges.
3. Facilitate the exchange of cutting-edge knowledge, tools and experiences among participants and integrate these insights into ICIMOD’s MHRA framework for the HKH region.

Participants:

Participants in this workshop will include technical experts specialising in meteorological modelling, hydrological and hydrodynamic modelling, sediment transport modelling and geo-hazard modelling. Additionally, participants who have worked in the field of ML/AI focusing on natural hazards such as floods, landslides, GLOFs, debris flows, drought and permafrost are also encouraged to participate in the workshop.

We will be inviting professionals from RMCs involved in the field of hazard modelling as participants and hazard modelling experts in the hackathon. Experts from ICIMOD will also join the hackathon.

The expected outputs of the MHRA workshop are as follows:

1. Multi-hazard Modelling Framework and Risk Profiles: The existing draft Multi-hazard Risk Assessment Framework (MHRA -framework) for the HKH region will be updated and tested with proof of concept based on different case scenarios. This framework will include hazard identification, multi-hazard interaction classification, multi-hazard modelling methodologies, information on open-source tools, vulnerability assessment methodology and multi-hazard risk profiles.
2. Model Demonstration and Visualizations: Each team will showcase and visualise multi-hazard interaction models they developed for different case scenarios during the hackathon. The final presentation will include explanation of methods, tools, results, discussions, conclusion, recommendations, and findings.
3. Comprehensive Workshop Report: The workshop report will document the workshop’s proceedings, discussions, findings, results, and recommendations for multi-hazard modelling and risk assessment to finalise the MHRA regional framework.

The expected outcomes of the MHRA workshop are as follows:

1. Enhanced understanding of multi-hazard interactions: Participants will gain a comprehensive understanding of the complexities of cascading, compounding, and amplifying multi-hazard interactions, particularly in the context of the HKH region.

2. Strengthen regional collaboration: This workshop will provide a platform for the technical experts and practitioners from the HKH region to collaborate and exchange knowledge in the research area of multi-hazard risks for different geographical regions within the HKH region.

3. Capacity building and skill enhancement: Even after the hackathon, the technical experts will work in collaboration to develop different multi-hazard interaction models and share the state-of-art tools and methodologies for multi-hazard modelling and visualization. This will improve the knowledge and skill set of the participants in multi-hazard modelling.

Possible multi-hazard modelling topics for the hackathon

1. Pakistan:

• Pakistan drought and flood 2021.
• Possible GLOF and subsequent flood and landslide scenario.

2. Nepal:

• Jure landslide and damming of Sunkoshi River, 2014 Nepal.
• Melamchi cascading flood, 2021, Nepal.

3. Bangladesh:

• Cyclone induced flood in the coastal region. Remal -May 2024

4. Bhutan:

• Windstorm induced landslide and/or floods in the mountains.

5. India:

• Forest fire, landslide, and flood with debris flow case scenario.

6. China:

• Earthquake induced landslide leading to flash floods.

Note: More topics is being researched and will be updated.