Rainfall-Induced Soil Slope Failure : Stability Analysis and Probabilistic Assessment

Rainfall-induced landslides are common around the world. With global climate change, their frequency is increasing and the consequences are becoming greater. Previous studies assess them mostly from the perspective of a single discipline—correlating landslides with rainstorms, geomorphology and hydrology in order to establish a threshold prediction value for rainfall-induced landslides; analyzing the slope’s stability using a geomechanical approach; or assessing the risk from field records.

integrates probabilistic approaches with the geotechnical modeling of slope failures under rainfall conditions with unsaturated soil. It covers theoretical models of rainfall infiltration and stability analysis, reliability analysis based on coupled hydro-mechanical modelling, stability of slopes with cracks, gravels and spatial heterogenous soils, and probabilistic model calibration based on measurement. It focuses on the uncertainties involved with rainfall-induced landslides and presents state-of-the art techniques and methods which characterize the uncertainties and quantify the probabilities and risk of rainfall-induced landslide hazards.

Additionally, the authors cover:

• The failure mechanisms of rainfall-induced slope failure
• Commonly used infiltration and stability methods
• The infiltration and stability of natural soil slopes with cracks and colluvium materials
• Stability evaluation methods based on probabilistic approaches
• The effect of spatial variability on unsaturated soil slopes and more