Geospatial Assessment of Landslide Hazard in Kinnaur District Using AHP-Based Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis

In mountainous regions, landslides cause substantial socio-economic harms since they are among the most common and damaging natural disasters. The Upper Satluj River Basin in Kinnaur district of Himachal Pradesh is particularly vulnerable to landslides due to its mountainous terrain and intricate geology. The Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) method of analysis is the foundation for the landslide hazard zonation (LHZ) mapping in study area. The authors of this study evaluated twelve factors based on how much they contributed to landslide incidents. The AHP method allows for an objective factor weighting process by determining the importance of each factor for the decision-making process through pairwise comparisons. The final landslide hazard zone map has been categorised into five hazard zones, from very low to low to moderate and high to very high levels. 36% of the study area is in the high to very high hazard zone, 30% is in the moderate hazard zone, and 34% is in the low to very low hazard zone. Most of these high-susceptibility zones are located in the northern, northeastern, and some central regions of the study area. A test using ROC curves and AUC measurements showed that the model's performance evaluation accuracy was 71%. The AHP-based model's prediction results for the study area demonstrate a trustworthy approach to landslide susceptibility assessment. The study provides crucial information for planning land use, disaster management, and infrastructure development across the Upper Satluj River Basin. To lessen the impact of landslides on infrastructure and communities, local governments and legislators must focus their mitigation efforts on high-risk areas that have been identified. This study proves that multi-criteria spatial analysis should be included in future research while also proving that the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) provides effective landslide hazard evaluation.