Some new research on the Newmark Displacement Method for earthquake-induced landslides indicates that the method may be on the unconservative side. The Landslide Blog provides a short summary of the paper by Li et al. (2018) that was recently published in the journal Landslides. Their research was based on physical models on a shake table, comparing the results of the model experiments with a Newmark analysis. The paper should be worth a read for geotechnical engineers practicing in seismically active areas. It sounds like some additional study is needed to confirm these results and if they are true, propose different ways of analyzing earthquake-induced landslides.
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China Earthquake Coverage
The regular news media as well as the geo-blogosphere are all abuzz about Monday’s 7.9 magnitude earthquake in central China. Official death toll is at 12,000 right now and that’s in Sichuan Province alone. My guess is that number will swell substantially in the coming days. If you haven’t seen photos and video yet, they are absolutely gut-wrenching. My heart and prayers go out to the victims of this disaster. (Photo by Liu Hai, AP)
Several geo-bloggers have posts about the earthquake. Harold Asmis of Ontario-GeoFish describes the earthquake as a "big valley-thrust earthquake" or what he calls the "Fist of God". Dave’s Landslide Blog has started compiling reports of landslides related to the earthquake in this landslide prone region of China. And here is the USGS info on the earthquake.
Haiti Earthquake
The magnitude 7.0 earthquake in the impoverished nation of Haiti has clearly had devastating consequences. I don’t know what I can add in terms of useful information except perhaps to point interested readers to these additional sources of information. This is truly a heart-breaking situation. Click through for the links. (Photo by UNDP Global)