THE PHENOMENON OF AN EPOSITIVE INCREASE IN THE DENSITY OF THE MURDER MASS – THE CONSEQUENCE OF ITS AMBIGUOUS DEPENDENCE ON THE SLOPE WAYS OF MOVEMENT

The characteristics of each local volume of debris flow are continuously changing depending on the characteristics: a path of its movement (slope, width and roughness of channel), dis-charge, granulometric and mineralogical compositions of debris involved in debris-flow-formation, density, viscosity and plasticity of debris-flow mass, etc. Up to now, it believes that the debris-flow mass density depends unambiguously on the slope of path of a debris-flow. As a result of experimental and theoretical studies carried out at the Kazakh Research Hydrometeorological Institute (KazNIGMI), it was found that the course of the debris-flow process depends on the density of debris-flow mass. Identification of the ambiguity of the debris-flow mass density from the slope of the debris flow path led to the discovery of a nat-ural phenomenon: an abrupt change of the density of debris-flow mass when the critical val-ue of the slope of the debris flow path is exceeded (the Stepanov’s effect). Taking into ac-count the ambiguity of the debris-flow mass density from the slope of the debris flow path is a key element in computing debris flow characteristics.