Large Sinkhole Opens Near Denver City, Texas

I know this video made the rounds by email and on Geoengineer a while back, but I haven’t posted it here. It shows a novel way of installing piles in softer soil. Those guys have […]

The Redi-Rock Design Resource Manual or DRM has everything you would need to design a Redi-Rock retaining wall, including block sizes, design charts, construction details, and setback options.  The manual also includes case studies and […]

The site for the new Harrison County Hospital, approximately 25-miles west of Louisville, Kentucky had 15 sinkholes formed by limestone dissolution, a geomorphologic process referred to as Karst topography.  There were a number of geotechnical engineering and geological engineering challenges associated with the characterization, excavation, backfilling, foundation engineering and other mitigation measures as described by Peggy Hagerty Duffy, P.E. in her article entitled “Karst and Complications” in the August 2008 issue of Civil Engineering Magazine (Duffy, 2008b).

Mitigation measures for the sinkholes included use of graded filters with geotextiles, careful inspection of rock socket foundations along with pilot holes and careful geotechnical inspection throughout the construction process. One particularly interesting aspect of the project is that several of the sinkholes were used as drainage facilities to receive surface water runoff. Read on for a summary of this interesting article. (Photo of sinkhole in Karst Topography being used as a drainage feature, from Duffy (2008b), Civil Engineering Magazine)

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