MUDFLOW FLOODING SIMULATION AND SOLUTION PROPOSAL IN A VALLEY IN THE SOUTH OF PERU

Abstract

Due to the ‘El Niño’ phenomenon, intense rains occur from January to March on the entire coast of Peru, producing mudflows which flood the coastal valleys, generating great problems for the agriculture of the place by flooding the crops, as well as the obstruction of one of the main highways that connect this part of the country. In this research, a two-dimensional computational simulation of this mudflow flood is carried out, in a Valley called ‘Los Pescadores’. Previously, for this simulation, information and data from the valley were collected, such as the topography, rheology, roughness of soils, as well as the hydrology of the basin of this valley. The flooding flow is a concentration of water and sediment; this corresponds to a non-Newtonian flow. After calibrating the simulation, a solution proposal is presented, in which it is proposed to channel the river that crosses this valley with an embankment dam and the construction of a bridge over the main road. Subsequently, the mudflow was simulated again with the proposed hydraulic structures, obtaining a satisfactory solution. With the final simulation, the magnitude of the flow, the depth, flow velocities and the length of the dike were calculated, as well as the length of the bridge. Finally, the cost of the proposed solution was determined.