News release: Federal scientists assess unusual river-erosion disaster in Ecuadorian Amazon
Scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and Bureau of Reclamation traveled to rural Ecuador to work with scientists from the Corporacion Electrica del Ecuador (CELEC) in assessing an unusual and catastrophic geohazard: the collapse of a 132-meter-tall (433 foot) lava dam on the Rio Coca, which triggered massive erosion along the river that has damaged critical infrastructure (roads, buildings, pipelines) and cut off transportation corridors to local communities. Before 2020, the Rio Coca cascaded over a lava dam as the famous San Rafael waterfall, Ecuador’s tallest. Over several months, a large sinkhole formed just upstream of the waterfall. The river re-routed through the sinkhole on February 2, 2020, undercutting the lava dam (which collapsed in 2021) and triggering major retrogressive erosion that has been migrating upstream for the past three years…