Colin's PhD research uses differential remote sensing imagery and field observations following the Kaikōura earthquake to investigate the relationship between fault rupture and co-seismic mass wasting. Landslides and rockfall were heavily concentrated around surface fault ruptures during the Kaikoura earthquake and Colin's interest lies in assessing the role that fault displacement, damage zones and high frequency shaking proximal to the ruptures played in the distribution of these failures.

After completing her Masters of Science at the University of Edinburgh, Dina is currently doing her PhD at Victoria University. The aim of Dina's PhD is to research the post-seismic sediment cascade from the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake. Through the use of field observations, topographic analysis, and hydrodynamic modelling, she is investigating the controls of coseismic sediment evacuation as well as the impact of landslide sediment on channel evolution and river morphology. Dina is particularly interested in the millennial-scale erosional processes and how it is preserved in the cosmogenic nuclide concentration.

Caleb’s PhD project utilises a range of methods, including remote sensing, geophsyics ground investigation and numerical modelling to determine the mechanisms of failure of large volume (>1 Mm3) landslides triggered by the Kaikōura Earthquake. This research seeks to quantify the role of surface fault rupture, ground-shaking, and site geology and morphology in the generation of large landslides during powerful earthquakes. Outputs from this project will feed into future work modelling landslides at a landscape scale and producing regional hazard models.

Katie is currently a PhD student at Victoria University researching sediment remobilisation from co-seismic landslides following the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake. Regional landslide generating events offer natural experiments with which to observe and measure the rate of erosion and sediment transfer in the first few years following the triggering event. Utilising pre- and post-earthquake remote sensing data collection to quantify the post-seismic mass wasting, the output of this PhD is to develop a regional-scale time series analysis of the hillslope-channel sediment cascade at a high spatial resolution.

This PhD project aims to improve the understanding of coseismic landslide initiation along faults. Based on the dataset of the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake, the interaction between surface fault rupture, earthquake-induced ground shaking and slope failure will be investigated using geomorphological and structural analysis techniques, laboratory testing as well as physics-based local-scale numerical modelling. The output of the project will be used to further develop the national New Zealand landslide forecast tool.

I completed my Masters degree in Geology from the Central Department of Geology, Tribhuvan University, Nepal in 2016. I am doing my PhD in modelling river response to landslide sedimentation in braided and steepland rivers from the University of Auckland. I am working on modelling the sediment response for sediment transport, studying morphologic change in the downstream section due to time varying landslide delivery of sediments, estimating the threshold sediment amount for sediment management and creating different scenarios of sediment delivery and comparing the results.