Buried by 100 Feet of Rock; California's Destructive Chaos Jumbles Landslide

A major landslide within California recently buried a 2.6 square mile swath of land in an average of 14 meters or 46 feet thick of rock, wiping out more than 300,000 trees. This all occurred across a mere 55 seconds, with debris running up more than 350 feet from the valley floor or an adjacent mountain. The landslide in question is known as the Chaos Jumbles, and is one of the most recognizable landslide deposits within Lassen Volcanic National Park.

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Google Earth imagery used in this video: ©Google & Data Providers

Various licenses used in sections of this video (not the entire video, this video as a whole does not completely fall under one of these licenses) and/or in this video's thumbnail image (and this list does not include every license used in this video and/or thumbnail image):

Sources/Citations:
[1] U.S. Geological Survey
[2] Clynne, M. A., & Muffler, L. J. P. (2010). Geologic map of Lassen Volcanic National Park and vicinity, California (Scientific Investigations Map 2899). doi:10.3133/sim2899.
[3] Eppler, Dean & Fink, Jonathan & Fletcher, Raymond. (1987). Rheologic properties and kinematics of emplacement of the Chaos Jumbles rockfall avalanche, Lassen Volcanic National Park, California. Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres. 92. 10.1029/JB092iB05p03623.

0:00 Chaos Jumbles
0:35 Primary Landslide
2:15 2nd & 3rd Landslides
3:47 Cinder Cone Relation
4:13 Another Large Landslide

[SkepticalRaptor]

I hike all over the Chaos Jumbles a couple of years ago. There was an interesting informational hike that described what happened, but your version was much more informative.

[drtrowb]

Chaos Jumbles is a good name for a cat

[WildWestGal]

Wow. I've hiked Lassen Peak... I haven't wandered into this jumble area, however! Thanks for another great informational video!

[xwiick]

Thanks for all the hard work on these videos!

[joecserna]

I’ve hiked all around that area. Top of Lassen. Bottom of the Cinder Cone. Out into the jumbles. Bumpass Hell. It’s like going home when you do these videos!❤

[WilsonEywlkyutbe-sb]

Excellent production as usual. Thank you

[bevinboulder]

Fascinating Timothy! Thanks for another great video.

[mapleleaf]

Interesting historical event. Thank you!

[Androsynth]

It’s crazy that all of these domes are only about 1100 years old. Especially when you see them nearly as prominent in the skyline as their neighbor Mt Lassen as seen from Redding. I’ve hiked up to these and they are not small. Like a mini mountain range.

[ShawninRI]

Been to LNP a few times. Great place to visit if you love volcanoes. There are so many different features that represent different eruptive styles/products. Chaos Jumbles is aptly named…. a massive expanse of broken reddish brown rock.

[glennk.]

The geologic scale of time is so amazing!

[AhJodie]

Wow! I would think there are stories of some of this from the Indigenous peoples who may have passed the stories of the events down. I know a lot of information has been lost, but the sound alone would have caused people to notice. There were probably animals doing all sorts of weird things too! Thank you for sharing this!

[Cerbera]

Thank you for the video and a comment for the algorithm 😊🪨

[GaylordHinshaw]

This type of landslide is called a runout slide. Underwater these can create the worst kind of tsunami.

[SVBlueRecluse]

Great work. I got to visit the Chaos Jumbles a few months ago on a college field trip. The professor referenced the theory of the jumbles being caused by explosions as well as just a landslide. The landslide from Shasta travelled much further and was much more immense. I can't remember if you did an episode on the Shasta Landslide also.

[annatheinnotz]

Some things you just can't prepare for and can't survive. That is massive.

[justinpyle]

We americans appreciate the olympic pool references for volume

[northascrowsfly]

As a geologist with a healthy YouTube channel, you'd be the perfect candidate to present these events in the context of 'what if this happened now.' Even if you limited the scope to roughly the last five thousand years, that is not very long ago in human terms. So, I'm sort of suggesting a theme for future videos. Give us the science like you did in this video, but also let us know what the consequences would be, today. I remember seeing the devastation from the Oso landslide in 2014, for example, but then there was a mini-documentary that showed all of the historical landslides along that same valley. Those are the type of 'what if they happened now' events that interest me.

[nigelbrockton]

I remember watching a documentary about long run-out landslides, where they assessed the evidence for various theories, including the "trapped air" hypothesis. However, they concluded that the most likely mechanism is actually that rocks at the interface, between the ground and the moving material, actually act like ball-bearings to facilitate the long run-out. What is the evidence for trapped air being responsible in this instance?

[Light-in]

Could you please use a comparison that might be more meaningful, a larger object like an aircraft carrier or a football field or a soccer pitch or even something larger? Thanks.