KING 5 reporter Glenn Farley says that unlike many other landslides in Washington state history, the impending Rattlesnake Ridge landslide isn’t being brought on by rain or groundwater.
“It seems to be more gravity with a little water mixed in,” Farley said on KING 5’s The Sound Podcast. “How much water it’s taking to grease the skids if you will, or is it just the fact that there’s just not enough integrity there on the sand.”
Farley said the devastating Oso slide, which killed 43 people in 2014, occurred in part due to heavy rainfall in weeks leading up to the landslide.
Farley said the fact the Rattlesnake Ridge ground is slowly breaking apart allows geologists to study the slide, while possibly warning locals in Yakima County.
Farley added this is the third large slide in the state in the last nine years. The Nile Valley landslide happened in 2009.
