SPH Simulation of High-Volume Rapid Landslides Triggered by Earthquakes Based on a Unified Constitutive Model. Part I: Initiation Process and Slope Failure

Abstract

Landslides triggered by seismic loading pose a great threat to human lives, property, and infrastructure. This paper embeds a unified constitutive model in the smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) method and analyzes the initiation process of landslides. A seismic wave is applied to bottom boundary particles by imposing velocities calculated using the seismic wave. The bottom boundary is set as a no-slip boundary and the free field boundary is chosen to reduce seismic wave reflection. The reliability of the developed SPH method is first validated by the simulation of a benchmark problem of thin plate oscillation and stability analysis of a homogenous slope. Initiation of the earthquake-induced Tangjiashan landslide is then simulated as a case study. Formation of a shear zone under the action of seismic loading is followed by the formation of a continuous slip surface at about 15[Formula: see text]s. The sliding surface formed in the SPH simulation agrees well with the speculative sliding surface based on field observations. The velocities of monitored points during the initiation process are also captured by the SPH method.