Mam Tor Fieldclass

Sunday 12th March

depart from Department at 8.45am
Pick up Greenbank at 9am
return approx. 6pm (depending on traffic)

You will need:

standard field gear

mapping board
notebook
compass-clinometer
ruler
stationary
camera?
LUNCH

Slope stability II
EOSC316 Engineering
Geoscience

Types of landslide

Rock failure
failure plane predetermined

Soil failure
failure plane along line
of max stress

Types of landslide
Rock failure
failure along pre-determined planes of
weakness

Soil failure
failure along lines of max. stress
frictional, cohesive = rotational
frictional, incohesive = planar

Rotational landslip analysis

For undrained frictionless failure
total stress analysis

For cohesive and frictional failure

method of slices
Bishops conventional method (can take into
account pore water pressure)

Rotational slip
total stress analysis
or u = 0
strength parameters
are those of
undrained soil

Cr
F=
We
2

where
F = restraining moment
disturbing moment
C = cohesive strength (Pa)
r = slip circle radius (m)
= slip sector in radians
W = weight of sliding sector (N)
e = eccentricity of sliding sector (m)

Method of slices
Swedish circle
method
For use with cohesive
and frictional soils
Cr + 1 N n tan
n

F=

T
n

1 n

Effect of a tension crack

Reduces the angle of
the sliding sector
Height of tension crack:
For frictionless soil

hc =

2C

Cohesive and frictional soil

hc =
tan 45 +

2C

C = cohesive strength (Pa)

= unit weight of soil (N m-3)
= friction angle

Location of slip circle centre

No simple way trial
and error
F more sensitive to
horizontal movements
than vertical
movements

Effective stress analysis

GWL
Pf = h x w

h
L

Cr + 1 ( N n Pf Ln ) tan
n

F=

T
n

1 n

Other methods of analysis

Taylors stability analysis
used for frictional and cohesive soils
uses a dimensionless number to iterate
towards a solution

Bishops method
effect of forces on each side of slice
considered
iterative method

Landslip monitoring

Flowslides
Soil, clay, rock debris may behave like
liquid; water content is > liquid limit
flowslide

Flowslides are extremely mobile

e.g. Yungay, Peru, 1970

Mt. Huascaran, Peru, 1970

earthquake triggered
flowslide
hit towns of Yungay
and Ranrahirca, 18
km away, at around
150 km/hr
Yungay completely
buried, 66,000 dead

Flowslide, Slumgullion, Colorado

National natural
landslide laboratory
Major slip ~3500
years ago, present
slip ~1000 years ago

The Mam Tor head scar looking west

Mam Tor landslide

Occurred due to glacially oversteepened
slopes
Age ~3600 years, from radiocarbon dating
of tree remains recovered from boreholes
~300 m wide and ~1000 m long
Upper part
multiple rotation landslide

Lower part
debris flow

Cross-section through the Mam Tor landslip

Geological map and movements at each station

- 1996 to 2002

Correlation
of
movements
with rainfall

An analogue
for
sedimentation
in half-graben.
Derbyshire
County Council
is the
transportation
agent!

Mam Tor references

Skempton, A.W. et al., 1989, The Mam
Tor landslide, North Derbyshire, Phil.
Trans. Royal Soc. Lond. 329, 503-547
Rutter, E.H. et al., 2003, Strain
displacements in the Mam Tor landslip,
Derbyshire, England, J. Geol. Soc. Lond.
160, 735-744.