The influence of initially unsaturated clay on the macro-stability of river dikes

In the Netherlands the design condition for a dike is surmised to occur during winter where it is assumed that the dike is fully saturated. Preliminary results by Van Duinen (2020) indicate that suction remains present, albeit ever decreasing, during the winter. This means that it would be possible for a dike to dry out during the summer period...

Connecting deterministic and numerical methods to better estimate the probability of flooding for clay dikes

Dikes protect people and lands all around the globe. With rising sea levels, the importance of well-designed dikes has never been more essential. One of the main factors that can compromise the stability of dikes are macro-instabilities. Macro-instabilities can cause dikes to lose their water bearing potential, leading to floods. Methods are...

A Metamodelling Approach to Reliability Updating with Dike Construction Survival

The construction of a dike improvement often causes a decrease in reliability during construction. Raising a dike may give rise to excess pore water pressures in the subsoil, resulting in a temporal strength decrease. Observing the survival of such a loading condition might provide information on the strength of a dike. Therefore, this research...