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Characteristics and mechanism of a landslide at Anqian iron mine, China

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Abstract

Owing to the heavy rainfall, a landslide occurred at the Anqian Iron mine, at 18:00(UTC + 8) on November 24, 2019, in China. The landslide was about 3.0 × 104 m3 and caused damage to the road of transporting waste materials. Failure characteristics and the mechanism of this landslide were analyzed in this study. The landslide area was divided into three parts: the rear tension cracking area, the middle sliding deformation area, and the front colluvium area. A contact-free measuring technique using the new ShapeMetrix3D system was applied and 204 joints were analyzed based on equal-angle stereographic projection. Thus, a conceptual model of the mechanism of the landslide was constructed and the formation process of the landslide was divided into three stages: the first shearing and dislocation stage; the second sliding, front bulging, and rear tractive cracking stage; and the third local rock mass collapse and colluvium depositing stage. Numerical modeling was performed to discover the landslide mechanism by progressively reducing the shear strength of rock mass. The results showed that the original slope was stable, whereas heavy rainfall triggered the landslide, and the predicted failure surface matched closely the field investigations. The factor of safety obtained by real three-dimensional analyses was slightly higher than that obtained by plane problem analyses, and the difference was attributed to the three-dimensional effect of the landslide. This paper also presents the results obtained from the parametric analysis in order to understand the impact of shear strength parameters on the overall stability of the slope.

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All data and material used to support the findings of this study are included within the article.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to express our gratitude to the editors and reviewers for their constructive and helpful comments.

Funding

Shu-wei Sun was supported by the National Key Research and Development Plan (No. 2017YFC1503103) and the National Natural Science Fund of China (No. 51574245).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Energy and Mining Engineering, China University of Mining and Technology (Beijing), Beijing, 100083, China

    Shu-wei Sun, Bo Pang, Jia-bing Hu & Zhao-xi Yang

  2. Anqian Mining CO., LTD., Anshan, 114043, China

    Xiao-yu Zhong

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  1. Shu-wei Sun
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  2. Bo Pang
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  3. Jia-bing Hu
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  4. Zhao-xi Yang
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  5. Xiao-yu Zhong
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Contributions

All authors contributed to this study. Shu-wei Sun and Bo Pang designed the research study. Shu-wei Sun and Jia-bing Hu analyzed the field data. Shu-wei Sun wrote this paper. Zhao-xi Yang and Xiao-yu Zhong reviewed the manuscript. All authors gave final approval for publication.

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Correspondence to Shu-wei Sun.

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Sun, Sw., Pang, B., Hu, Jb. et al. Characteristics and mechanism of a landslide at Anqian iron mine, China. Landslides 18, 2593–2607 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10346-021-01671-z

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