STABILITY ANALYSIS FOR AN AIRPORT EMBANKMENT, EVALUATING SHORT AND LONG TERM TECHNIQUES
Keywords:
Stability of Embankment, Numerical Analysis, Stone Columns, Vertical GeodrainsAbstract
This article discusses the stability analysis corresponding to the construction project of a
runway embankment over the soft clay, to reach the subgrade level, that confirm the foundation of the
runway No. 16/34, for the project Aeropuerto International de Chincheros Cusco - Peru (AICC). The safety
analysis consists in evaluating the strength reduction of the foundation, considering the effect of the
consolidation, for the short-term and long-term construction techniques considering the soil improvement
with preloading, vertical geo-drains and stone columns techniques. The numerical analysis is developed with
the Plaxis 2D v8.6 software, considering a typical section corresponding to a critical sector, located on the
km 1+180 progressive of the landing strip. According to the results of the definitive geotechnical study, the
foundation soil, corresponding to the analysis section, is a saturated soft clay, until a depth of 35 m; then to
model its mechanical behavior was used the Soft Soil Model; and for the embankment, that will be
constructed of compacted soil obtained from the ground cutting process, was considered the Mohr-Coulomb
model. The physical and mechanical parameters were established based on the results of field and laboratory
test, correlations and referential values established in the specialized bibliography. From the comparative
results based on the calculated safety factors, the stone columns technique presents a higher factor of safety
compared to the preloading and vertical geo-drains techniques; while considering the short-term construction,
the foundation soil fails due to loss of strength before reaching the total embankment height.