The northern coast of Peru has been experiencing anomalously warm (4-5C) sea surface temperatures (SST). These high SSTs have produced intense and prolonged rainfall that has resulted in extensive flooding, and on the 26th March 2017, the Rio Piura in northern Peru burst its banks leading to loss of life, displacement of people and damaged infrastructure. Peru is intimately linked to the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO): fishermen first identified El Niño in the late 19th Century off the north coast of Peru. The phenomenon driving this current acute rainfall event has been dubbed 'El Niño Costero' or Coastal El Niño, but is not El Niño per se as it is not being driven by anomalous SSTs in the central Pacific (Niño 3.4), which generally defines the onset of El Niño. Rather it represents more local (Niño1+2) El Niño-like conditions last known to have occurred in 1925, which is considered the most intense flooding of the 20th Century. Despite Peru's preparedness for the global El Niño in 2016, the country appears to be overwhelmed by the sudden shift from La Niña drought to the intense rainfall of El Niño Costero, suggesting this type of locally driven El Niño event has hitherto been overlooked. It is essential to establish a record of El Niño Costero alongside ENSO, especially as the 1925 event was the most extreme on record. If local SSTs cause El Niño-like conditions and play an important part in climate dynamics in northern Peru, but have so far been overlooked, then we don't have a full understanding of tropical Pacific climate change. Critical to understanding equatorial Pacific climate change are records of extreme flood events that reflect El Niño-type behavior, and in particular how El Niño Costero fits within the wider climate picture. This proposal is based on a unique opportunity to quantify and determine the dynamics and evolution of a large magnitude flood, and to use its sedimentary signature, coupled to climatological data over the last 120 years, to unequivocally fingerprint and calibrate past El Niño-type events in recent lake sediments. We will (a) undertake a geophysical survey of lakes in the Rio Piura catchment that act as repositories of flood-waters and sediments, and we will identify modern flood sediments and determine their depth and extent; (b) recover and survey surface sediments related to flooding to characterize their flood signature using grain size, geochemistry and mineral magnetics; (c) recover and date short sediment cores from our survey lakes and directly compare the flood signature of the 2017 El Niño Costero to the 1925 event, as well as putting it in the context of 20th Century ENSO variability. Our study will provide a framework for reconstructing El Niño-related flood events from lake sediments over the recent past in northern Peru, but has the potential to establish a much longer-term (Holocene and older) history of all El Niño variability in the region.

The mobilisation and transport of coarse sediment, referred to as bedload, has a profound impact on the evolution of mountain rivers, the surrounding basins they feed, and the communities that live within their catchments. However, we have few effective methods to routinely monitor bedload transport in near real-time because it is such a high energy and erosive environment under peak flow conditions. Hence, bedload monitoring can be considered a missing component of real-time environmental monitoring. In 'Sounding Out the River' we take advantage of low cost seismic sensor systems that have become available because of the rise of technology such as the Raspberry Pi computer and the ease to which these systems can be telemetered. We will demonstrate this system for monitoring the mobilisation and transport of bedload along the River Feshie in Scotland, which is catchment already monitored for a range of scientific projects. In order to ensure that the system is useful, usable and used we will co-produce the design with a range of stakeholders including SEPA, CEH, Practical Action Nepal and cbec eco-engineering UK Ltd. Beyond this proposal, we will then be able to address a range of environmental challenges, for example: - In Nepal the supply of coarse bedload to the mountain front has resulted in successive channel avulsion events on the Kosi River. This has caused the displacement of vulnerable people and the deposition of gravels across agricultural land has devastated communities. Through near real-time monitoring of bedload transport, we can better understand the dynamics of such systems and have the potential to develop early warning. - When rivers carry bedload, their erosive capacity increases; and when the bedload is deposited the beds become armoured. This poses a clear challenge for managing critical infrastructure. - Forecasting of flood hazard requires knowledge of the shape of the river bed. However, when flood waters mobilise the bedload, the shape of the bed changes which poses a problem for flood modelling. Our near-real time monitoring system has the potential to inform where and when we would expect flood models to start breaking down. - Bedload transport is an important process that cascades in the wake of other hazards, such as the monsoonal mobilisation of coarse sediment derived landslides triggered by the 2015 Nepal earthquake. It is often the case that these secondary processes (bedload transport) do not receive the same attention as the primary hazard (earthquake induced landsliding) because the uncertainty is often described as cascading, implying growing uncertainty. We believe that through the effective use of the monitoring proposed in this project, we have an opportunity to constrain the uncertainty and manage this cascading hazard.

Landslides and floods are globally occurring natural hazards that pose a significant threat to human life and sustainable development. The most severe losses due to landslides occur in the less economically developed countries of Asia and South America, particularly in those with mountainous topography, earthquakes and monsoonal climates. Landslides and rockfalls in these regions often detach fractured bedrock and deliver large boulders downslope that block roads, destroy buildings and kill people. On entering the river channel network, boulders may be bulldozed by large floods and block hydropower infrastructure, jeopardizing electricity supply and the economy. Thus, boulders may cause a cascade of hazards. This project addresses specific landslide and flood risk management problems brought to our attention by stakeholders impacted by boulders in the Upper Bhote Koshi catchment in Nepal, one of the most landslide and flood-prone countries in the world. This project also addresses a lack of data and scientific understanding of (i) boulder production on hillslopes (e.g. by landslides), (ii) boulder transport in floods. In this two year project, an inter-disciplinary team of researchers will work closely with project partners to (1) map boulders and investigate the controls on boulder production on hillslopes by landslides and rockfalls, (2) develop a new real-time GPS boulder tracking system with which to improve understanding of boulder movement in floods and monitor hazardous boulders (3) engage with stakeholders to incorporate findings into disaster management plans and ultimately to increase resilience to landslide and flood hazards. The project will focus on the Upper Bhote Koshi (UBK) catchment to the north east of Kathmandu, Nepal, and has been designed with specific end users in mind in the UBK that are dealing with boulder hazards related to landslide and floods. This area is particularly vulnerable to boulder hazards as it is the main road link between Nepal and China and contains several major hydroelectric power plants including the Upper Bhote Koshi Hydroelectric Power plant (UBKHEP). The catchment encapsulates the multitude of natural hazards faced by Nepal. In 2015 the catchment was shaken by the Gorkha earthquake generating some of the highest densities of landsliding anywhere in Nepal. In July 2016, a complex monsoon flash flood entrained extremely large boulders (>8 m) some of which became jammed in the sluice gates of the UBKHEP culminating in more than $110 m damage to the power station. The power station remains closed resulting in lost revenue and compromising Nepal's energy supply. As the power company rebuilds and a further hydroelectric power station is built just downstream, it will be vital to properly account for future boulder hazards in landslide and floods. The project brings together an interdisciplinary team of researchers based in the UK, Germany and Nepal with several project partners that have helped to define the problems that this project will address. The boulder hazard map and boulder tracking system developed in this research will help make the Bhote Koshi Power Company and wider hydropower industry more resilient to landslide and flood hazards. The research will also benefit organizations managing transport infrastructure and communities living on steep, landslide prone hillslopes in the Bhote Koshi. We will hold two project workshops bringing together project partners and relevant stakeholders from industry, local communities and government institutions with the help of Practical Action Consulting Nepal, to research boulder hazard perception and enhance uptake of this research into risk management practice at local and national governance level and ultimately to aid development in Nepal and South Asia.

Landslides and floods are globally occurring natural hazards that pose a significant threat to human life and sustainable development. The most severe losses due to landslides occur in the less economically developed countries of Asia and South America, particularly in those with mountainous topography, earthquakes and monsoonal climates. Landslides and rockfalls in these regions often detach fractured bedrock and deliver large boulders downslope that block roads, destroy buildings and kill people. On entering the river channel network, boulders may be bulldozed by large floods and block hydropower infrastructure, jeopardizing electricity supply and the economy. Thus, boulders may cause a cascade of hazards. This project addresses specific landslide and flood risk management problems brought to our attention by stakeholders impacted by boulders in the Upper Bhote Koshi catchment in Nepal, one of the most landslide and flood-prone countries in the world. This project also addresses a lack of data and scientific understanding of (i) boulder production on hillslopes (e.g. by landslides), (ii) boulder transport in floods. In this two year project, an inter-disciplinary team of researchers will work closely with project partners to (1) map boulders and investigate the controls on boulder production on hillslopes by landslides and rockfalls, (2) develop a new real-time GPS boulder tracking system with which to improve understanding of boulder movement in floods and monitor hazardous boulders (3) engage with stakeholders to incorporate findings into disaster management plans and ultimately to increase resilience to landslide and flood hazards. The project will focus on the Upper Bhote Koshi (UBK) catchment to the north east of Kathmandu, Nepal, and has been designed with specific end users in mind in the UBK that are dealing with boulder hazards related to landslide and floods. This area is particularly vulnerable to boulder hazards as it is the main road link between Nepal and China and contains several major hydroelectric power plants including the Upper Bhote Koshi Hydroelectric Power plant (UBKHEP). The catchment encapsulates the multitude of natural hazards faced by Nepal. In 2015 the catchment was shaken by the Gorkha earthquake generating some of the highest densities of landsliding anywhere in Nepal. In July 2016, a complex monsoon flash flood entrained extremely large boulders (>8 m) some of which became jammed in the sluice gates of the UBKHEP culminating in more than $110 m damage to the power station. The power station remains closed resulting in lost revenue and compromising Nepal's energy supply. As the power company rebuilds and a further hydroelectric power station is built just downstream, it will be vital to properly account for future boulder hazards in landslide and floods. The project brings together an interdisciplinary team of researchers based in the UK, Germany and Nepal with several project partners that have helped to define the problems that this project will address. The boulder hazard map and boulder tracking system developed in this research will help make the Bhote Koshi Power Company and wider hydropower industry more resilient to landslide and flood hazards. The research will also benefit organizations managing transport infrastructure and communities living on steep, landslide prone hillslopes in the Bhote Koshi. We will hold two project workshops bringing together project partners and relevant stakeholders from industry, local communities and government institutions with the help of Practical Action Consulting Nepal, to research boulder hazard perception and enhance uptake of this research into risk management practice at local and national governance level and ultimately to aid development in Nepal and South Asia.

The Hub will reduce disaster risk for the poor in tomorrow's cities. The failure to integrate disaster risk resilience into urban planning and decision-making is a persistent intractable challenge that condemns hundreds of millions of the World's poor to continued cyclical destruction of their lives and livelihoods. It presents a major barrier to the delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals in expanding urban systems. Science and technology can help, but only against complex multi-hazard context of urban life and the social and cultural background to decision-making in developing countries. Science-informed urbanisation, co-produced and properly integrated with decision support for city authorities, offers the possibility of risk-sensitive development for millions of the global poor. This is a major opportunity - some 60% of the area expected to be urban by 2030 is yet to be built. Our aim is to catalyse a transition from crisis management to risk-informed planning in four partner cities and globally through collaborating International governance organisations. The Hub, co-designed with local and international stakeholders from the start, will deliver this agenda through integrated research across four urban systems - Istanbul, Kathmandu, Nairobi and Quito - chosen for their multi-hazard exposure, and variety of urban form, development status and governance. Trusted core partnerships from previous Global Challenge Research Fund, Newton Fund and UK Research Council projects provide solid foundations on which city based research projects have been built around identified, existing, policy interventions to provide research solutions to specific current development problems. We have developed innovative, strategic research and impact funds and capable management processes constantly to monitor progress and to reinforce successful research directions and impact pathways. In each urban system, the Hub will reduce risk for 1-4 million people by (1) Co-producing forensic examinations of risk root causes, drivers of vulnerability and trend analysis of decision-making culture for key, historic multi-hazard events. (2) Combining quantitative, multi-hazard intensity, exposure and vulnerability analysis using advances in earth observation, citizen science, low cost sensors and high-resolution surveys with institutional and power analysis to allow multi-hazard risk assessment to interface with urban planning culture and engineering. (3) Convene diverse stakeholder groups-communities, schools, municipalities private enterprise, national agencies- around new understanding of multi-hazard urban disaster risk stimulating engagement and innovation in making risk-sensitive development choices to help meet the SDGs and Sendai Framework. Impact will occur both within and beyond the life of the Hub and will raise the visibility of cities in global risk analysis and policy making. City Partnerships, integrating city authorities, researchers, community leaders and the private sector, will develop and own initiatives including high-resolution validated models of multi-hazard risk to reflect individual experience and inform urban development planning, tools and methods for monitoring, evaluation and audit of disaster risk, and recommendations for planning policy to mitigate risks in future development. City partnerships will collaborate with national and regional city networks, policy champions and UN agencies using research outputs to structure city and community plans responding to the Sendai Framework and targeted SDG indicators, and build methods and capacity for reporting and wider critique of the SDG and Sendai reporting process. Legacy will be enabled through the ownership of risk assessment and resilience building tools by city and international partners who will identify need, own, modify and deploy tools beyond the life of the Hub.