Abstract
When a failure occurs in a project, the first action is to immediately take necessary measures to ensure the stability of the remaining intact structure and protect the overall safety. The next action is to quickly assess the extent of the failure and undertake measures to reconstruct the failed portion and continue the repairs, etc. Only after these initial actions is the systematic analysis done to find the cause of the failure. Very often this analysis is omitted and lessons are not learned. The proper step would be to apply forensic methods to do the analysis of the failure using scientific and legalistic investigations to detect the causes of the failure which could be attributed to geotechnical origin. Such a critical analysis which should be undertaken simultaneously with the first action would provide answers to “what went wrong, when, where, why, how and by whom.” This procedure gives strong inputs to improve future designs and also to identify the qualifications and expertise required for the staff. As the forensic analysis is basically a back analysis based on actual failure observations, normally adopted standard procedures of testing, analysis, design, and construction are not adequate in the majority of cases. This paper gives an overall view of the procedures to be adopted in forensic analysis.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
ASCE (1989) Guidelines for Failure Investigation. Task Committee on Guidelines for Failure Investigation
Day RW (1998) Forensic geotechnical and foundation engineering. McGraw Hill, New York.
Green DC (1988) Principles for providing geotechnical data in construction contracts. In: Conference on dams, Queenstown, Tasmania (also in Ancold Bulletin No. 81.)
Leonards GA (1982) Investigation of failures. J Geotech Eng Div ASCE GT2 108:187–246
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer India
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Rao, V.V.S. (2016). Guidelines for Forensic Investigation of Geotechnical Failures. In: Rao, V., Sivakumar Babu, G. (eds) Forensic Geotechnical Engineering. Developments in Geotechnical Engineering. Springer, New Delhi. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-81-322-2377-1_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-81-322-2377-1_3
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New Delhi
Print ISBN: 978-81-322-2376-4
Online ISBN: 978-81-322-2377-1
eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)