Seismic reliability of slope stability considering spatial variability of soil properties

A comprehensive method for the reliability of layered systems under earthquake loading is proposed in which the inherent variability of earth materials are considered as well as their spatial variations and the uncertainty of the specified earthquake loadings, and the stress for a given slope are determined through static finite element analysis. Using Monte Carlo simulation, the method evaluates the total failure probability of a slope considering the correlation among potential sliding surfaces and its effects on reliability. The results of case studies of homogeneous and layered earth slopes indicated that spatial variability of soil tends to reduce the estimated probability of sliding failure, that it is significant to consider the correlation between potential failure surfaces in assessing the failure probability and that the calculated probability appears to be not sensitive to the spatial correlation distances within the values reported for actual soils. (author). 4 refs., 2 figs., 5 tabs