Climate anomalies associated to the occurrence of rockfalls at high-elevation in the Italian Alps

Climate change is seriously affecting the cryosphere, in terms, for example of permafrost thaw, alteration of rain/snow ratio, glacier shrinkage. There is concern about the increasing number of rockfalls at high elevation in the last decades. Nevertheless, the impact of climate variables on slope instability at high elevation has not been fully explored yet. In this paper, we investigate 41 rockfalls occurred at high elevation in the Italian Alps between 1997 and 2013 in the absence of an evident trigger.

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