Landslide is a movement of soil, rock, and debris down a sloped part of land. It is a natural disaster that sometimes is unavoidable when the stability of a slope decreases or changes due to natural or instigated factors. Basically, it is gravity acting upon the earth that already has pre-conditional factors. Landslide may be caused but not exclusive to these natural causes: erosion, earthquakes, piling of groundwater or flooding because of heavy rain, weak soil structure and composition. There are also human activities that may contribute to, or even cause, a landslide, these includes: deforestation, vibrations caused by heavy machinery, quarrying, and mining; with heavy rainfall, they will increase the fragility and decrease the integrity of the earth. Landslide as a natural disaster can cause property damage, injury, and death. Multiple impact factors that interact and may cause landslides can be modeled to create a precusor signal for early warning and prevention of this natural disaster. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) along with maps and weather and precipitation data have been used with Machine Learning algorithms and predictive analytic models to make reliable and life-saving forecasts.
With the Philippine’s aggressive modernization and infrastructure programs, and the abundance of elevated and sloped lands, paired with the increasing and intensifying typhoons, it is important to understand and map landslide susceptibility of its areas especially the provinces near elevated areas and bodies of water using a reliable prediction model. The province of Laguna in the Philippines, according to the Philippines Statistics Authority QuickStat for June of 2018, consists of 6 cities, 24 municipalities, and 681 barangays, with a total population of 3,035,081 and an annual growth rate of 2.47. The province is beside the southern part of Laguna de Bay, the largest lake in the Philippines and on its southern bother are two dormant volcanoes, Mount Makiling and Mount Banahaw. Cities and municipalities of the province are popular for numerous hot spring resorts found near the Mount Makiling slopes. According to the Philippines Statistics Authority, the province of Laguna, Philippines, covers a total area of 1,917.85 km2 . It is situated at the southern part of Laguna de Bay. The province has 24 mountains, most of which are inactive volcanoes, including Mt. Banahaw giving the province the highest peak of 7,120 ft. It is also home to a significant number of tributaries due to its proximity to Laguna de Bay, Taal Lake, Caliraya Lake, and Lumot Mahipnon Lake. Some cities and municipalities of the province of Laguna are along the Marikina Valley Fault system; being situated in areas where landslides factors are present and can inflict great disaster, the lack of studies and data on landslide susceptibility in the province of Laguna poses a great threat to its residents.