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Step-path failure of rock slopes with intermittent joints

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Abstract

Step-path failure is a typical instable mode of rock slopes with intermittent joints. To gain deeper insight into the step-path failure mechanism, six rock slopes with different intermittent joints are studied using the 2D Particle Flow Code (PFC). Three different step-path failure modes, i.e., shear, tensile, and mixed tensile–shear failure, are observed by focusing on the crack initiation, propagation, and coalescence in the rock bridges. The cracks develop progressively in the rock bridges, which induce the intermittent joints to coalesce one by one from bottom to top under the action of gravity. The tensile cracks that often appear in the main body and at the crown are nearly vertical to the step-path failure surface. The step-path failure in a rock slope with intermittent joints can be divided into four stages in terms of both stress and crack development in the rock bridges, i.e., elastic deformation, failure of rock bridges at a lower position, progressive failure of rock bridges upward, and final block slide. Therefore, reinforcement is suggested to be applied to the lower part of the slopes. Three equations for calculating the factors of safety are derived with respect to the three failure modes, in which the degree of joint coalescence is considered.

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Acknowledgments

This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41172243, 41472245, and 41130745), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (No. CDJZR12205501 and No. 106112014CDJZR200009), and the open Foundation of State Key Laboratory of Geohazard Prevention and Geoenvironment Protection (No. SKLGP2011K003).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Civil Engineering, Chongqing University, Chongqing, 400045, China

    Da Huang & Duofeng Cen

  2. Key Laboratory of New Technology for Construction of Cities in Mountain Area, Ministry of Education, Chongqing, 400045, China

    Da Huang

  3. School of Civil, Environmental and Mining Engineering, The University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA, 6009, Australia

    Guowei Ma

  4. State Key Laboratory of Geohazard Prevention and Geoenvironment Protection, Chengdu University of Technology, Chengdu, 610059, China

    Runqiu Huang

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  1. Da Huang
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Correspondence to Da Huang.

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Huang, D., Cen, D., Ma, G. et al. Step-path failure of rock slopes with intermittent joints. Landslides 12, 911–926 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10346-014-0517-6

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