Snow depth and avalanches until now and in future - GIS-modelling of climate change impact on Austrian snow cover and avalanche release susceptibility. : 12th Congress INTERPRAEVENT 2012, Grenoble / France
Digital maps of the snow depth are basis of the assessment of the avalanche release susceptibility and of the protection effect of forests and degence constructions. Climate scientists predict a decrease of snow accumulation and an increase of the proportion of fluid precipitation in the Austrian Alps as a response of climate change. This could lead to a change of avalanche danger. Because of their spatial resolution, presently available digital maps of recent snow depth result in insufficient avalanche susceptibility maps. These maps also may underestimate the snow depth of high altitudes as a consequence of the lack of meteorological stations in high altitudes and because of the derivation from the elevation only ba linear extrapolation.
