Darian's Blog

  Week 13: Coastal Erosion In Panama, there are some parts of the country where coastal erosion occurs. According to the U.S. Climate Resilience Toolkit, coastal erosion is when "local sea level rise, strong wave action, and coastal flooding wear down or carry away rocks, soil, and/or sands along the coast. Coastal erosion occurs when there are strong currents and high waves which erodes the coast by breaking off sediment particles or moving rocks. Since Panama gets a good amount of extreme weather events including storms and flooding, this causes the country to have coastal erosions. Furthermore, climate change and human activities plays a role in the creation of coastal erosion as well. Gardi Sugdub, also known as Crab Island, is a tiny island off Panama's coast and has been a home to Guna Indigenous people for over 100 years. They have faced many problems and coastal erosion is one of them with floods and storms causing a rise in sea levels. Not only are floods and storms c

Week 10: Extreme Weather Events   In Panama, there are many extreme weather events that occur in the country such as intense and protracted rainfalls, windstorms, floods, droughts, wildfires, earthquakes, landslides, tropical cyclones, and tsunamis. The most common extreme weather event that occurs in Panama would be rainfalls which causes floods and landslides. In Panama, this is called the hurricane/rainy season which happens from June to November. Panama isn't usually directly impacted by hurricanes, but these hurricanes cause heavy rainfall and other hazards to inhabit the country. The people and country of Panama deal with many extreme weather events as Panama ranks 14th among countries most exposed to multiple hazards based on land area. One of the extreme weather events Panama goes through are floods because of the common occurrence of heavy rainfall. On November 21, 2021, there was a deadly flash flood warning in Panama which took the lives of two people with one gone missi

Week 8: Mass Wasting Risks Occasionally, there are some mass wasting risks that occur in Panama. When talking about mass wasting, we're describing the risks of landslides, mudslides, and rockslides, which are the results of flooding and heavy rainfall. When heavy rain occurs, sloped areas become soaked which causes no root support and the soil just runs off. In Panama, they receive some hurricanes and a good amount of heavy rainfall especially during the hurricane/rainy season which occurs during June to November in the Atlantic. Panama is no stranger to landslides since they receive a lot of heavy rainfall and they have had some devastating landslides in the past. In November 2022, there was a devastating and deadly landslide that took place in Cativá, Panama which took two lives in the process. The cause of this deadly landslide was heavy rains that inhabited the country of Panama which also caused flooding as well. The previous day, there was another landslide in Las Cumbres, Pa

Week 4: Volcanoes In Panama, there are a total of four volcanoes which isn't as many compared to other countries. Two of these volcanoes are Holocene while the other two are considered as Pleistocene volcanoes. Going more into detail, Holocene volcanoes are volcanoes that were active in the past 11,700 years while Pleistocene volcanoes are volcanoes that were active from 11,700 to 2.5 million years ago. The Tisingal and La Yeguada volcanoes are the two Pleistocene volcanoes that are located in Panama which aren't active. However, the Baru and El Valle volcanoes are the two Holocene volcanoes that are located in Panama which are active. The El Valle volcano is considered to be a still active volcano, but there hasn't been any recorded evidence of when it last erupted. However, the Baru volcano is the youngest major volcano located in Panama and the most recently active which it last erupted around 500 years ago in 1550. In 770 AD, the Baru volcano largely erupted which destr

  Week 3: Earthquakes and Mitigation In Panama, it is common for earthquakes to occur. This seismicity map shows that Panama doesn't get a lot of big earthquakes often, but however, they still have earthquakes hitting their country. Most of these earthquakes haven't caused any major damage throughout the country but there were some that caused great destruction and travesty through Panama. For example, the Panama Viejo earthquake took place on May 2, 1961 and was recorded as the first major earthquake on the Isthmus of Panama. This earthquake caused destruction to the old town in Panama, Panama la Vieja, and many of the buildings in the town were destroyed. Another earthquake was The 1991 Limon earthquake on April 22, 1991 where the epicenter was actually in Costa Rica, but was strong to the point that most fatalities happened in Panama. There were 127 fatalities in this natural disaster and 79 of them were people from Bocas del Toro Province in Panama. Adding on, there were al

Week 2: What are Tectonic Plates? Tectonic plates are huge, irregular slabs of solid rock which is usually made up of continental and oceanic lithosphere, the outermost shell on Earth. These plates can cause many different type of things such as earthquakes, volcanoes, mountain building, etc. According to the USGS, tectonic plate size and thickness varies for each single plate making them different with the plate sizes ranging from "a few hundred to thousands of kilometers across" and the thickness ranging from "less than 15 km for young oceanic lithosphere to about 200 km or more ancient continental lithosphere". Tectonic plates actually created the Isthmus of Panama. According to Donovan, it's stated that instead of the isthmus "rising and subsiding ocean levels or existing as a string of islands as scientists previously believed, the Isthmus of Panama was first a peninsula of Southern Central America before the underlying tectonic plates merged it with S