Surface and borehole seismic imaging with both P and S waves enhance site assessments and reduce risks at difficult and complex geotechnical sites. These technologies increase the effective radius of investigation of boreholes alone and provide improved site parameters such as dynamic elastic modulus. Case…
Rock falls and lining failures are potential hazards in tunnels. The current paper presents three case histories of the management of tunnel risks in the Wellington Region. Rock fall inspections are required by Land Transport New Zealand in the Orongorongo water supply tunnel to allow…
This paper discusses how debris flows, a commonly occurring natural hazard in mountainous regions of New Zealand, may be recognised and identified from field and desk studies for sites that are being considered for development. Use is made of a particular case study from the…
Introduction The 2010-2011 Canterbury earthquake sequence, the 2010 Maule Earthquake in Chile as well as the 2011 Tohoku earthquake in Japan, has shown that saturated loose sandy ground is extremely prone to liquefaction1-4. In the case of Canterbury earthquakes the scale of devastation caused by…
Abstract Blue Slip is characterised by the unfavourable outcrop of bentonite 3km north of Kekerengu, North Canterbury. Despite repeated landslides impacting the key transport corridor below the landslide remains poorly defined. The aim of this research is characterisation of the landslide using methodology adopted from…
The graph in Fig 1, taken from Kaipara District Council’s May 2000 “Engineering Code of Practice for Land Subdivision and Development” illustrates the way in which soil Runoff Coefficients may vary according to (i) ground cover and (ii) rainfall intensity (mm/h). Fig 1 – Runoff…
The Tauranga Harbour Link project represents a major upgrade of the existing harbour crossing and approaches. It comprises a two lane incrementally launched bridge and major viaduct structure spanning road and rail links. This paper presents the details of the pile construction methodology using bentonite…
The design of piles is typically undertaken using empirical or semi-empirical methods developed for ‘regular’ silica sands or clays. The application of such methods to geological materials whose physical characteristics are unlike those on which the conventional design methods were derived can result in unconservative…
Repeated observations from recent earthquakes show that the vertical ground acceleration can be amplified significantly and even become greater than its horizontal counterpart in certain situations, raising great concern over the potential effect of vertical acceleration on engineering structures. This paper addresses this issue for quay…
This paper presents a brief case study investigating the performance of the Kalamata quay wall that exhibited permanent displacement following a Mw 5.9 earthquake. The aim of the investigation was to attempt to predict the observed damage to the wall using available analysis techniques – chiefly simplified analytical…
