Seventeen people, including several children, are known to have died and a further eighteen are missing after a mudslide hit the spa resort of Shovi in the Racha-Lechkhumi and Kvemo Svaneti Region of Georgia on Thursday 3 August 2023. The landslide, which was apparently triggered by heavy rainfall in the area, is reported to have destroyed most of the resort. Landslides are a common problem after severe weather events, as excess pore water pressure can overcome cohesion in soil and sediments, allowing them to flow like liquids. Approximately 90% of all landslides are caused by heavy rainfall.
Rescue workers search through a slurry of mud and debris that covered the spa resort of Shovi in the Racha-Lechkhumi and Kvemo Svaneti region of Georgia on Thursday 3 August 2023. Georgia Civil.
Although the immediate trigger for the event appears to have been the heavy rainfall which has fallen in the region this summer, geologists from the Georgian National Environment Agency had been warning that there was a danger of a significant landslip in the Bubistskali River Valley, which is not normally prone to such events, since 2021, when it was discovered that significant melting had taken place on the Buba and Tbilisa glaciers at the head of the valley, weakening sediments in the area, and leaving them vulnerable to a sudden movement should a suitable trigger (such as a sustained period of heavy rainfall) occur.
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