Climate change is raising landslide risks in southern Appalachia

# What happened in the southern Appalachians

# Why climate change matters here

Karin Rogers, director of the National Environmental Mapping and Applications Center at the University of North Carolina Asheville, described the sequence that worsened Helene's impacts: a significant rainfall event two days before Helene that saturated soils, followed by Helene's rain. Rogers said, "There has been a history of landslides in this part of North Carolina. … It's a known phenomenon. … But after Helene, it was devastating."

# What researchers are building

Rogers' team and the North Carolina Geological Survey are creating an early warning system. The system will combine three types of data:

• Storm forecasts that predict where heavy rainfall is likely to fall.
• Maps of past landslides to show where slopes have failed before.
• Soil moisture information to indicate how close soils are to saturation.

Layering these datasets lets forecasters identify the locations that face the highest near-term risk during a given storm. The aim is to deliver actionable warnings so people in those zones can move to safety before conditions trigger a slide.

Typical flood and storm warnings provide broad guidance across larger regions. The early warning approach described here is spatially specific: it seeks to pinpoint slope-by-slope risk using historical failure locations and current soil conditions tied to an incoming storm. That specificity matters in mountainous terrain where risk can change dramatically over short distances.

# Practical implications for communities

Residents in historically slide-prone corridors should be aware that more intense storms increase their risk. Local emergency managers and agencies that maintain landslide inventories will be primary users of the new warnings. If the system works as intended, it could direct targeted evacuations and reduce loss of life by focusing resources on the places most threatened during a storm.

# What remains to be done

near real time and establishing communication channels to get warnings to vulnerable residents quickly. Continued mapping of past landslides and monitoring soil moisture will be necessary to keep the system accurate as climate-driven rainfall patterns evolve.

# Bottom line

Steep slopes in the southern Appalachians have always been susceptible to landslides. Increasingly intense storms and sequences of heavy rainfall are raising the probability that those slopes will fail. Researchers are developing a data-driven early warning system to translate storm forecasts, landslide history, and soil moisture into actionable, location-specific alerts for communities at risk.