The Hatlestad Slide was a slide of mud and rock which occurred in the early morning of September 14, 2005 in a rural area in Bergen, Norway, as a result of heavy rainfall. The slide killed three people, wounded seven, and displaced many more, as it hit a row of residential houses in its path while the houses' occupants were asleep. The event is notable not only for the loss of life it caused, but also for how it altered Norwegian policies on environmentalism and housing construction, as well as emergency management. In addition, the question on whether or not to end the treatment of fatally wounded Kristina Hjartåker, who was put on a ventilator until her death in February, sparked national debate, both on the case itself and on the ending of life-prolonging treatment in general.
Hatlestad before the slide
Hatlestad Terrasse, a rural neighborhood in the borough of Fana, consists of clusters of housing units in a hilly setting. A single one-lane street connects the housing units to each other's and to Osvegen, a major two-lane road directly connecting the town of Os to the area of Nesttun. Hatlestad Terrasse 40, 42, 44 and 46, the grey-roofed houses closest to Osvegen, were the ones to be hit by the slide.
Before the Hatlestad Slide, Norway maintained a liberal policy when it came to housing construction on hills. The area of the afflicted housing units were therefore not surveyed for landslide risk before construction was commenced in the sixties, and the risk of landslides did not become known until later. After construction was finished, there were several incidents of rocks dislodging from the cliff and hitting the road. The rocks did not cause material damage or personal injury, and the municipality took no action besides setting up a warning sign by the road. Despite repeated complaints from Hatlestad's residents about this problem and the general risk of landslides, the municipality did not secure the area, stating that securing land against landslides is the responsibility of the property owner. However, an order given to the property owners to secure the hill were never responded to, and the case was never resolved.
The Hatlestad landslide
Indirect causes
According to the post-slide report released by Multiconsult and reviewed by NTNU, several potential indirect causes 'should be discussed': First of all, starting weeks before the slide, Western Norway was subjected to record-breaking precipitation and winds, which increased in strength when the remains of Hurricane Maria reached shore. The rainstorm, named Kristin by meteorologists, caused floods, traffic jams, material damage and power outages. The precipitation gradually increased pore pressure between the mountain and loose masses, adding to the damage of a process of erosion from surface water. This process may have been further hastened by the possible breach of a water pipe, indicated by a housing unit losing its water supply at around 5pm the day previous to the slide. Also, what may have contributed to the incident was a garage that was constructed in the neighbourhood on a fill-in site.
The Hatlestad Slide
At approximately 1:30 in the morning of 14 September 2005, the cliff over the houses of Hatlestad Terrasse broke apart; the resulting slide of clay, mud and rocks did not collapse the buildings. The debris flowed through the ground floors of several houses and buried ten people. Occupants on higher floors were not touched by the flowing debris and were then evacuate through non-first floor windows. The municipality and the city hospital were both put on disaster alert, and a large number of emergency responders, including 12 ambulances, were sent to the scene. The first unit to reach the site was a fire engine which arrived only three minutes after the slide, as it was already in the area, having just completed a water draining mission, and it was able to use its siren to awaken residents for the start of an evacuation. In addition to firefighters and paramedics, the Civil Defense and the National Guard also responded. Search dogs were used to locate survivors because heavy machinery could not be deployed due to the unstable nature of the ground; the extraction of buried survivors was made by hand, and with tools such as axes and shovels.
Aftermath
Fatalities and wounded
A woman (51) who was buried by the slide was dead by the time she was found and recovered at about 7:30. A second woman (27) died in hospital a few days later. A four-year-old, Kristina Hjartåker, died in February the next year. Several more people were wounded by the lack of oxygen while buried.