Deep, Dynamic In Situ Excess Pore Pressure Response of a Medium Dense Sand
Publication: Lifelines 2022
ABSTRACT
The Port of Portland has identified the deep and thick deposit of medium dense sands underlying its runways and terminals as a significant risk to post-earthquake recovery. Efforts to design mitigation of liquefaction and lateral spreading below its runways have been complicated by the inability to easily sample these soils and the lack of case history data on the performance of medium dense sands at depth. This paper describes a joint agency-industry-university collaboration to quantify the dynamic response of such soils at depth using controlled blasting tests conducted at the Port of Portland near Portland International Airport (PDX). The experimental field-testing program is described, including the geotechnical characterization of the deposit, instrumentation, and blasting program. The typical characteristics of the blast-induced ground motions are quantified to highlight the reduced significance of P-waves, owing to their frequency content, in the dynamic response of the sand. Following the presentation and discussion of typical shear strain and corresponding excess pore pressure time histories for various blasts, the relationship between shear strain and excess pore pressure is quantified in the medium dense sands at an average depth of 25 m and 2.5 atmospheres of vertical effective stress. The relationship between shear strain and excess pore pressure will be used by the Port and its consultants to calibrate constitutive models used to assess various ground improvement alternatives.
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Lifelines 2022
Pages: 152 - 166
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Published online: Nov 16, 2022
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