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Stability Analysis of the Zhangmu Multi-Layer Landslide Using the Vector Sum Method in Tibet, China

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Stability Analysis of the Zhangmu Multi-Layer Landslide Using the Vector Sum Method in Tibet, China Bulletin of Engineering Geology and the Environment https://doi.org/10.1007/s10064-018-1386-3 ORIGINAL PAPER Stability analysis of the Zhangmu multi-layer landslide using the vector sum method in Tibet, China Mingwei Guo1 & Sujin Liu1,2 & Shunde Yin3 & Shuilin Wang1 Received: 28 February 2018 /Accepted: 10 September 2018 # Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2018 Abstract The Zhangmu landslide is located on the China–Nepal border in Tibet, China, which has recently become a serious threat to the lives and properties of local people. In order to efficiently quantify the stability of the Zhangmu landslide, a new method named the vector sum method (VSM) is proposed. Differing from conventional slope-stability analysis methods, the VSM considers both the magnitude, the direction of force and the strength-reserving definition of the safety factor based on the actual stress field of slope achieved from finite element analysis. Moreover, the global sliding direction of potential landslides was theoretically deduced by the principle of minimum potential energy, while the safety factor can be directly computed by not only the force limit equilibrium of the whole sliding body in the global sliding direction but also the moment limit equilibrium at the moment center. Finally, stability analysis of the Zhangmu landslide was performed by the proposed method, and verified against the rigorous Morgenstern–Price method. Keywords Vector sum method . Slope stability . Limit equilibrium method . Strength reduction method . Zhangmu landslide Introduction most residential buildings and public facilities at Zhangmu Port have been built on an ancient rock slide, which is Zhangmu is the only overland and international trading port surrounded by the Boqu River, the Bangcundong Valley, the on the China–Nepal border in southern Tibet, China, located Qiangma Valley and the Zhangmu Valley. Geological survey about 80 km from Kathmandu, the capital of the Kingdom of (Jia et al. 2006;Mao2008;Huetal.2015;Maetal.2017)has Nepal, and 750 km from Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, China revealed that the Zhangmu landslide can be divided into two (Fig. 1). large old debris slides, i.e., the Old Fuliyuan debris slide and According to the latest statistics from the general adminis- the Old Bangcundong debris slide. Furthermore, it has been tration of customs of China in 2017, the total trade volume pointed out that the Zhangmu landslide is a multi-layer land- was about 0.88 billion USD between China and Nepal in slide from the surface to the bedrock comprised of modern 2016, and about 80% of the total trade passed through debris, old debris and rock debris. Therefore, the stability of Zhangmu port, which demonstrates the significant status of this multi-layer landslide has become the key issue in the trade the trade and economic development center of Zhangmu port. and economic development of the region, including the safety However, due to the constraints of its geographic location, of local people’s lives and properties. Since 1993, local landslides have occurred frequently each year. Therefore, Zhangmu port has been investigated * Mingwei Guo many times (Yi and Tang 1996; Xie et al. 2003;Jiaetal. [email protected] 2006;Zhuetal.2010), and preventitive measures have been taken after each geological investigation. However, these 1 State Key Laboratory of Geomechanics and Geotechnical measures have not efficiently prevented local landslides in Engineering, Institute of Rock and Soil Mechanics, Chinese Zhangmu port from occurring repeatedly at different depths Academy of Sciences, Wuhan 430071, Hubei, China or different locations. In 2013, in order to completely solve 2 University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China the stability problem of Zhangmu port, the Regional 3 Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Collaboration and Innovation Project between the Chinese Waterloo, Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1, Canada Academy of Sciences and Tibet was set up, entitled M. Guo et al. Fig. 1 Location of Zhangmu town (Ma et al. 2017) BGeologic exploration, risk assessmentand comprehensive In this study, in order to effectively assess the stability of a prevention and control of Zhangmu Landslide^ (Hu et al. multi-layer landslide, a new approach considering the vector 2015;Maetal.2017). Based on comprehensive investiga- characteristics of force is proposed based on the actual stress tion and analysis of the Zhangmu landslide, the quantitative state of the landslide achieved from the finite element method. stability analysis of the Zhangmu landslide has been studied With this new approach, the multi-layer landslide can be di- and is summarized in this paper. rectly assessed for potential sliding bodies with different Stability analysis of the Zhangmu multi-layer landslide using the vector sum method in Tibet, China depths. The proposed method is demonstrated in the slope Conventional methods for slope stability stability analysis of the Zhangmu multi-layer landslide. analysis The slope-stability analysis problem involves determining the The Zhangmu multi-layer landslide safety factor and corresponding critical slip surface, and, once the safety factor is defined, the critical slip surface can be Figure 2 shows the full view of Zhangmu port, which covers searched among admissible slip surfaces within the slope. To an area of 1.23 × 106 m2. From the figure, it can be seen that date, many methods have been developed to calculate the most residents live on this large rock slide. According to in- slope stability, such as the conventional Limit Equilibrium tensive geological survey and analysis, the geological struc- Method (LEM) (Bishop 1955; Fredlund and Krahn 1977; ture and landslide boundaries are shown in Fig. 3. Because of Duncan 1996), Strength Reduction Method (SRM) similar formation processes and geological structures for both (Zienkiewicz et al. 1975;GriffithsandLane1999), and the Old Fuliyuan debris slide and the Old Bangcundong debris Limit Analysis Method (LAM) (Chen et al. 2003; Viratjandr slide, unless specified, in the following for the purpose of and Michalowski 2006;Sloan2013; Lim et al. 2017). Among simplification, the Zhangmu multi-layer landslide in this pa- these methods, the definitions of safety factor can be mainly per refers to the Bangcundong multi-layer landslide. divided into two types, i.e. the strength-reserving definition Profile 3 (Fig. 4) is a classical profile of the Bangcundong and the overloading definition (Zheng et al. 2006). landslide, which shows the spatial distribution of the multi- For the strength-reserving definition, the safety factor is layer landslide, for which , from the ground surface to the defined as the number by which the shear strength parameters bedrock, there exists the modern sliding body, the old debris must be factored to bring the slope into the state of limit sliding body, an ancient rock debris deposit and the bedrock. equilibrium or failure. The popular LEM and SRM, which The modern landslide is the local failure of the Old are mainly used to quantify the slope stability, are all based Bangcundong debris slide, which is composed of schist, on this definition. gneiss clasts, sand, and silt. In addition, shear zones composed Considering the sliding body as a rigid body, LEM divides of silt soil with medium gravel have been found at different the sliding body into many slices, but it does not utilize the depths, a deep one can be considered as the shear zone of the stress versus strain characteristics of a slope. In order to obtain Old Bangcundong debris slide, while a shallow one is that of the safety factor and to determine a stability problem, many modern Bangcundong slide. The ancient rock slide is com- assumptions have to be made to establish the force or moment posed of cracked rock with original schist or gneiss between equations based on the limit state of these slices, such as the the bedrock and the debris deposits. Furthermore, the rock magnitude, the direction, and the position of forces acting on slide shear zone has been detected and is a thin layer of gravel the interface of the slices (Bishop 1955;FredlundandKrahn soil. The bedrock is mainly composed of mica schist, quartz 1977;Duncan1996; Zhu et al. 2003; Cheng et al. 2007; Zhou schist, and biotite plagioclase gneiss. and Cheng 2014; Chakraborty and Goswami 2016; Luo et al. For the physical and mechanical properties of the geolog- 2017). Compared with 2D methods, however, 3D limit equi- ical materials, many tests and back analyses were performed librium methods are far from maturity in both theory and to predict the mechanical properties of the geological mate- practice (Lam and Fredlund 1993; Huang and Tsai 2000; rials, and the recommended parameters are given in Table 1. Chen et al. 2006; Cheng and Yip 2007; Zheng and Tham 2009; Zhou and Chen 2013; Lu and Zhu 2016; Basudhar and Lakshminarayana 2017). Despite LEM is still remaining an effective tool in practical problems due to its simplicity and the existing experience in practical engineering, it has some inherent limitations, i.e., indeterminate static conditions, unre- alistic stress distributions, unsatisfied displacement compati- bility or problematic definition of soil–structure interaction. As an alternative approach to LEM, the Finite Element Strength Reduction Method (FE-SRM) was proposed as early as 1975 by Zienkiewicz and has been greatly developed all over the world (Zheng et al. 2005; Cheng et al. 2007; Hamdhan and Schweiger 2013; Isakov and Moryachkov 2014; Shen and Karakus 2014; Tu et al. 2016; Kelesoglu 2016;Tangetal.2017). The FE-SRM possesses some advan- tages over LEM, as it not only automatically locates the Fig. 2 Zhangmu town critical failure surface but also simulates the stress–strain M. Guo et al. Fig. 3 Geological map of the study area showing landslide boundaries, lithology, and profile lines Stability analysis of the Zhangmu multi-layer landslide using the vector sum method in Tibet, China Fig.
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