Location
Arlington, Virginia
Date
15 Aug 2008, 11:00am - 12:30pm
Abstract
On 28th October 2004 a rock failure occurred in a limestone open pit quarry in Tuscany (Italy). The phenomenon evolved slowly with the collapse of about 1000 cubic meters. The complex failure mechanism mainly involved plane sliding along stratifications with rotation and block toppling. The phenomenon continued to evolve slowly and on 3rd November failure extended to the neighbouring portion of rock with a total collapse of about 5000 cubic meters of rock. Failure analysis took advantage of an accurate characterization of geology, geometry and mechanical properties of the collapsed rock mass. Such analysis led to the conclusion that the failure has been caused by the concurrence of various factors, namely: - unfavourable dip and dip directions of stratification which daylight in the slope face; - possible reduction of the angle of shear resistance available along stratification especially as a consequence of intense rainfall and vibrations.
Department(s)
Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
Meeting Name
6th Conference of the International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering
Publisher
Missouri University of Science and Technology
Document Version
Final Version
Rights
© 2008 Missouri University of Science and Technology, All rights reserved.
Creative Commons Licensing
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Document Type
Article - Conference proceedings
File Type
text
Language
English
Recommended Citation
Presti, D. Lo; Cravero, M.; and Iabichino, G., "An “Unexpected” Rock Failure in a Limestone Open Pit Mine" (2008). International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering. 1.
https://scholarsmine.mst.edu/icchge/6icchge/session06/1
An “Unexpected” Rock Failure in a Limestone Open Pit Mine
Arlington, Virginia
On 28th October 2004 a rock failure occurred in a limestone open pit quarry in Tuscany (Italy). The phenomenon evolved slowly with the collapse of about 1000 cubic meters. The complex failure mechanism mainly involved plane sliding along stratifications with rotation and block toppling. The phenomenon continued to evolve slowly and on 3rd November failure extended to the neighbouring portion of rock with a total collapse of about 5000 cubic meters of rock. Failure analysis took advantage of an accurate characterization of geology, geometry and mechanical properties of the collapsed rock mass. Such analysis led to the conclusion that the failure has been caused by the concurrence of various factors, namely: - unfavourable dip and dip directions of stratification which daylight in the slope face; - possible reduction of the angle of shear resistance available along stratification especially as a consequence of intense rainfall and vibrations.
