Failure in Mohr–Coulomb soil cavities

In many cavities, resulting from both natural excavation and anthropic action, the phenomenon of the collapse of blocks from the cavity roof presents a serious safety hazard. In a previous publication the authors proposed a method to calculate the shape and dimensions of the collapsing block by means of the upper bound theorem of the plasticity theory. The soft rock material was modelled by means of the Mohr–Coulomb yield criterion, and the associated flow rule was considered for strain plastic velocity. The linear yield criterion was suitably regularized by means of a circle in the tensile zone. The boundary of the collapsing block is described by a paraboloid surface. An optimization procedure formulated in standard Kuhn–Tucker form and an analytical solution were obtained. The above-mentioned algorithm has been successfully applied to common soils of southern Italy. To validate the theoretical formulation, several numerical tests are performed. These tests show an optimal agreement with the closed-form solution. Therefore the proposed modelling may be used as an efficient guideline for the cavity-strengthening design.Key words: roof stability, regularized Mohr–Coulomb material, limit analysis, failure mechanics.