A Cusp Catastrophe Model of Instability of Slip-buckling Slope

Summary

A cusp catastrophe model is developed for slip-buckling slope by catastrophe theory, and the formulations of the necessary and sufficient conditions for instability of the slope are presented. It is found that different regions (II, III and IV in Fig. 4) in the control space divided by the bifurcation set correspond well to the primary, secondary and tertiary creep phases. The corresponding discriminate expressions for the slope in each of these three creep phases are given. The applicability of the cusp catastrophe model is tested by applying the equations to the Bawang Mountain landslide, located 5 kilometers above the Ertan hydroelectric power station along Yalong River in China. The method gives reasonable results.