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Landscapes of Transition pp 63–91Cite as

Postglacial Landform and Sediment Associations in a Landslide-Fragmented River System: The Transhimalayan Indus Streams, Central Asia

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Abstract

The chapter concerns deposits and land form associations along high mountain rivers interrupted by landslides. The catastrophic landslides are largely due to failure of rock walls that were over steepened by glaciers and debutressed by deglaciation. Some 180 rock avalanche deposits have been identified that form(ed) cross-valley barriers on the Upper Indus streams. They provide a common explanation for widely discussed features in the fluvial zone. Aggradational sequences, built behind the landslide barriers, include mass movement, lacustrine, fluvial, and aeolian materials. Breaching has led to distinctive sets of erosional landfonns, notably barrier-related and “defended” river terraces, trenched fans and fan terraces, rock gorges superimposed from valley fill, and mid-valley “isolated rocks.” Landslide interruptions have been major constraints on valley fill sedimentation and the phasing of late-, post- and para- glacial sediment transfers. Along with more frequent but smaller debris flow and avalanche barriers, and glacier interference with rivers, they have helped to produce a chronically fragmented drainage system. The interactions of a range of geomorphic and sedimentation processes in interrupted river reaches are decisive for the late Quaternary landscapes of the fluvial zone. The chapter focuses on the depositional and degradational landform associations involved. Climate change and tectonically driven stream incision, hitherto used to explain the features of interest, are shown to have been masked, suppressed or redistributed in response to interruptions of the river system. However, a further type of paraglacial transition is suggested involving postglacial responses of glacially destabilised rockwalls.

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  1. Cold Regions Research Centre and Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, Wilfrid Laurier University, 75 University Avenue West, Waterloo, Ontario, N2L 3C5, Canada

    Kenneth Hewitt

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    Kenneth Hewitt , Mary-Louise Byrne , Michael English  & Gordon Young , ,  & 

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Hewitt, K. (2002). Postglacial Landform and Sediment Associations in a Landslide-Fragmented River System: The Transhimalayan Indus Streams, Central Asia. In: Hewitt, K., Byrne, ML., English, M., Young, G. (eds) Landscapes of Transition. The GeoJournal Library, vol 68. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-2037-3_4

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