Flash floods with high sediment concentrations are common natural events

in mountain rivers, and the vulnerability associated these events are

expected increased in the future.
Numerical models are fundamental tools to design strategies aimed at
reducing potential damages caused by flooding. However, their
implementation is far from trivial, since multiple factors control the dynamics
of the flow, especially in mountainous regions, where the morphology of the
river channels and the sediment concentrations play a significant role on the
flood propagation.
In the Andes mountains in South America. Additional factors, such as El
Ni\~no-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) effects, generate rapid floods with high
concentrations of sediment on steep slopes. In this region, a large number of
flash floods have been recorded with catastrophic consequences.
The main objective of this investigation is to gain fundamental insights on
the effects of high sediment concentrations on the propagation of floods in
an Andean watershed.
We develop a 2D finite-volume numerical model of the non-linear shallow
water equations over natural terrains and complex geometries. We expand
the efficient model developed by \citeA{Guerra2014}, to incorporate the
effects of the sediment load on the dynamics of the flow, considering also
the changes on the rheology to account for the additional stresses produced
by the sediments.
We perform simulations of flows with different sediment concentrations in
the two main tributaries of the \textit{Quebrada de Ram\'on} watershed, an
Andean catchment located in central Chile, where part of the city occupies
the lower section of the river basin, at the foothills of the Andes mountain
range.
Our simulations show that the most important effects on the flood
propagation are observed in the range of concentrations from $0\%$ to
$20\%$.
By comparing simulations with clear water and $60\%$ of sediment
concentration, the maximum flow depth at different locations along the
channel became $38\%$ deeper and total flooded area $76\%$ bigger.
The results also show that other hydrodynamic variables, such as the arrival
time to the peak flow or the shape of the hydrograph, are not significantly
affected by the sediment concentration.
In future research we will perform multiple simulations to focus on
developing a real-time automated system of hazard prediction due to floods,
generated by different meteorological conditions.