Analysis of DInSAR data in urban areas affected by subsidence or slow-moving landslides

Abstract

Subsidence and slow-moving landslides systematically cause social, economic and environmental impacts all over the world. For this reason studies aimed at both the characterization of subsidence and slow-moving landslides and the analysis of the consequences on the exposed elements interacting with them are of great interest for the scientific and the technical community. These studies, to be useful in land use planning and management, need a huge number of displacement measurements within and on the boundary of the affected areas. Recently the scientific community has shownan increasing interest in the potential of using satellite observation techniques and, in particular, interferometric methods of Synthetic Aperture Radar (DInSAR)image processing. The literature review on DInSAR applications highlights the possibility of further researches pursuing the exploitation of DInSAR potentiality in studies at different scales and the development of procedures for the proper use of interferometric data and their validation with reference to well documented case studies. To this end, this PhD Thesis is aimed at developing original procedures for the analysis of the interferometric measurements specifically devotedto pursue two main objectives: the characterization of the phenomena of interest and the prediction of consequences to buildings interacting with them. The conceived procedures were tested, in sample areas of the Campania region (southern Italy)following a multi-scale approach. With reference to subsidence phenomena, the studies at small-scale involved the entire region and were mainly aimedatdetecting subsiding macro-areas; within these latter, more detailed studies at medium scale were carried out and the most affected municipalities were individuated. At large scale,focusing on one of these municipalities, studies dealing with the analysis of parameters whose variation leadsto the generation of the damage were carried out. Finally, at the scale of the single building the interferometric data were interpretedaccording todamageability criteria adopted in engineering practice. As forslow-moving landslides, the joint use of interferometric measurements and damage surveysallowed the updating of landslide inventory maps at medium scale and the analysis of the consequencesthrough the generation of fragility and vulnerability curves within a test area including 21 municipalities of BeneventoProvince. At large-scale studies were performed on a landslide-affected area within the municipality of Ascea(Salerno Province) in order to follow the evolution - in space and time - of the analyzed phenomenon as well as to deepen its kinematic behavior, in turn useful for zoning purposes. The obtained results highlight that the conceived procedures can valuably integrate the current practice for land use planning and as well as for the selection of the most suitablemanagement strategy.