Location
Arlington, Virginia
Date
14 Aug 2008, 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Abstract
A proposed 9.833-kilometer road to evacuate quarried limestone materials to a state cement factory near the city of Calabar in the south-south sub-region of Nigeria passes through a 130-meter wide Kwa River, six meters deep with one and half kilometers of swampy terrain on either sides. The right-of-way of the road on both sides of the river is composed of 1.00 meter thick brownish lateritic Sands and Silty Clays (SC) underlain by 2.00 meters of gravelly lateritic Sands (SW). Below these are indurated shales and limestone (SH/LST) that make up the Mfamosing limestone sequence. Borings made at both abutments of the 130-meter wide Kwa River indicated that 2.00 meters of Organic Silty Clays (OL), 4.00 meters of Well-graded Sands and Gravels (SW) and 6.00 meters of Sandy Silty Clays (SC) form the lithology at the left abutment of the proposed bridge across the Kwa River, while 1.00 meter of greyish Sandy Silty Clays (SC) and 5.00 meters of organic Silty Clays (OL) form the materials at the right abutment of the same bridge. These materials are all underlain by indurated Shale and Limestone to depths beyond 30.00 meters at both abutments of the bridge. Geotechnical engineering properties of the Sandy Silty Clays (SC), the organic Silty Clays (OL) as well as the well-graded Sands and Gravels that lie on top of the underlying Shale and Limestone indicate that lengths of piles that will bear the weight of the proposed bridge should be about 15.00 meters on the left abutment and about 10.00 meters on the right abutment. The paper describes in details, the lithology and engineering properties of the sub-grade materials at intervals of 0+500 meters along the entire length of the road as well as proffers the construction methods to be adopted in emplacing piles in the karst topography.
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
Teme, So-ngo Clifford and Ubong, Essien, "Subsurface Geotechnical Engineering Investigations for a 9.833-Km Long Road and 130-Meter Wide Bridge in a Karst Topography in South-South Nigeria" (2008). International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering. 8.
https://scholarsmine.mst.edu/icchge/6icchge/session08c/8
Subsurface Geotechnical Engineering Investigations for a 9.833-Km Long Road and 130-Meter Wide Bridge in a Karst Topography in South-South Nigeria
Arlington, Virginia
A proposed 9.833-kilometer road to evacuate quarried limestone materials to a state cement factory near the city of Calabar in the south-south sub-region of Nigeria passes through a 130-meter wide Kwa River, six meters deep with one and half kilometers of swampy terrain on either sides. The right-of-way of the road on both sides of the river is composed of 1.00 meter thick brownish lateritic Sands and Silty Clays (SC) underlain by 2.00 meters of gravelly lateritic Sands (SW). Below these are indurated shales and limestone (SH/LST) that make up the Mfamosing limestone sequence. Borings made at both abutments of the 130-meter wide Kwa River indicated that 2.00 meters of Organic Silty Clays (OL), 4.00 meters of Well-graded Sands and Gravels (SW) and 6.00 meters of Sandy Silty Clays (SC) form the lithology at the left abutment of the proposed bridge across the Kwa River, while 1.00 meter of greyish Sandy Silty Clays (SC) and 5.00 meters of organic Silty Clays (OL) form the materials at the right abutment of the same bridge. These materials are all underlain by indurated Shale and Limestone to depths beyond 30.00 meters at both abutments of the bridge. Geotechnical engineering properties of the Sandy Silty Clays (SC), the organic Silty Clays (OL) as well as the well-graded Sands and Gravels that lie on top of the underlying Shale and Limestone indicate that lengths of piles that will bear the weight of the proposed bridge should be about 15.00 meters on the left abutment and about 10.00 meters on the right abutment. The paper describes in details, the lithology and engineering properties of the sub-grade materials at intervals of 0+500 meters along the entire length of the road as well as proffers the construction methods to be adopted in emplacing piles in the karst topography.
