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Identifying Geotechnical Characteristics for Landslide Hazard Indication: A Case Study in Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India

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Abstract

The slope failures cause significant damage, and the slope failure assessment can help understand the underlying factors contributing to these disasters. These disaster risks can be reduced through landslide monitoring and generating early warning alerts at vulnerable sites. Furthermore, the parameters to ascertain the instability for a given region were not explored. Therefore, criteria can be evaluated based on the understanding developed from local conditions, as it might be tedious to perform slope stability analysis for such large areas. Thus, an extensive site investigation was conducted in a study area subjected to numerous slope failures in Mandi, India. The primary goal of this study was to investigate the factors contributing to the slope failures. The present study was planned in the area anticipated for anthropogenic landslides due to construction activities. Hence, a series of geotechnical tests were performed, and the corresponding data from 26 soil samples obtained from different sites (with and without slope failures) of the Mandi region were employed for the current study. The geotechnical characteristics were determined using field and laboratory investigations from the collected soil samples, and thereby, their relationship with the slope failure occurrences was evaluated using multivariate correlation analysis. The results revealed that the most influential parameters for slope instability in this study area are saturated permeability, porosity, suction, in-situ density, in-situ water content and the angle of internal friction. Further, a comparison of these parameters, their critical values indicating failures have been presented with different study areas from the literature.

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Abbreviations

SWRC:

Soil–water retention curve

AEV:

Air entry value

PDF:

Probability density function

USCS:

Unified soil classification system

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Mandi, Mandi, India, 175075

    Naresh Mali, Dericks P. Shukla & Venkata Uday Kala

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  1. Naresh Mali
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  2. Dericks P. Shukla
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  3. Venkata Uday Kala
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Correspondence to Venkata Uday Kala.

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Communicated by Zeynal Abiddin Erguler.

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Mali, N., Shukla, D.P. & Kala, V.U. Identifying Geotechnical Characteristics for Landslide Hazard Indication: A Case Study in Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India. Arab J Geosci 15, 144 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-022-09475-8

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