Journal of Natural Disaster Science

A PREDICTION METHOD FOR SURFACE FAILURES BY MOVEMENTS OF INFILTRATED WATER IN A SURFACE SOIL LAYER

Takashi OKIMURA
Associate Professor, Faculty of Engineering, Kobe University
and
Ryuhei ICHIKAWA
Engineer, PASCO Corporation, Osaka (Former Graduate Student)

(Received 13 Dec., 1984 and in revised form 1 May, 1985)

Abstract

Three factors; the inclination angle, the depth of the potential failure layer and the catchment area, are deemed the most important of the many factors that are involved in surface mountain slope failures. A groundwater movement model is proposed with which to obtain the height of the groundwater table in the potential failure layer. Instead of the catchment area, the height of the groundwater table, which is influenced by the topographical characteristics of a mountain slope, is used in our new prediction method. This new prediction method, based on infinite slope stability analysis, takes into account the three most important factors. Results show that our new method can be used to predict accurately past failed sites.

Key words

mountain slope failure, rain, groundwater, surface soil, land form, slope stability, degree of risk