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Forensic Analysis of Failure of Retaining Wall

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Forensic Geotechnical Engineering

Part of the book series: Developments in Geotechnical Engineering ((DGE))

Abstract

In this paper result of forensic analysis of a cantilever retaining wall for road approach embankments which showed distress in the form of translation, vertical settlements and rotation is presented. Extensive geotechnical soil investigation and field measurements of distress are collected. The paper presents prominent causes of failure of cantilever retaining wall using forensic geotechnical investigation. Back analysis of the cantilever retaining wall is performed using classical conventional methods and finite elements analysis. From the results of the conventional analysis and finite element methods, it is observed that the retaining wall designs based on prescriptive guidelines may not lead to satisfactory designs and considerations of deformations are important. Back analysis of failure showed that the mechanism of failure is a combination of sliding and overturning and the deformations are in conformity with the predictions obtained from the numerical analysis.

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Correspondence to G. L. Sivakumar Babu .

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© 2016 Springer India

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Sivakumar Babu, G.L., Raja, J., Munwar Basha, B., Srivastava, A. (2016). Forensic Analysis of Failure of Retaining Wall. 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_30

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-81-322-2377-1_30

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, New Delhi

  • Print ISBN: 978-81-322-2376-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-81-322-2377-1

  • eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)

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