Uncertainty quantification of landslide runout motion considering soil interdependent anisotropy and fabric orientation

Abstract

Natural soils often exhibit an anisotropic fabric pattern as a result of soil deposition, weathering, or filling. This paper aims to investigate the effect of soil interdependent anisotropy and fabric orientation on runout motions of landslides and evaluate the most critical fabric orientation for the post-failure behavior. The shear strength properties of soil deposit (i.e., cohesion c and friction angle φ) are modeled as negatively cross correlated bivariate random fields. The results reveal that the spatial variability and the negative cross-correlation of c and φ notably influence the post-failure behavior. In addition, the rotation of soil layer orientation significantly affects the runout motion. Based on the analyses, the deposition orientation of 30∘ is identified to produce the highest mean value and standard deviation of the runout distance. The findings from this study highlight the importance of considering the orientation of soil stratification, rather than only the magnitude of shear strength, in assessing the post-failure behavior of a landslide.