Proceedings ISC-2 on Geotechnical and Geophysical Site Characterization, Viana da Fonseca & Mayne (eds.

)
2004 Millpress, Rotterdam, ISBN 90 5966 009 9

Application of advanced geophysical technologies to landslides

and unstable slopes
Robert J. Whiteley
Coffey Geosciences Pty. Ltd. Sydney, NSW, Australia

Keywords: geophysics, imaging, landfill, landslides, refraction, resistivity, seismic

ABSTRACT: Landslides and slope instability result from particular properties of soils, rocks and groundwater, their distribution and interaction. Quantification of these factors can be achieved by combining direct geotechnical testing and indirect geophysical investigation. Geophysical technologies assume increased importance where direct subsurface investigation by drilling is constrained by unfavourable and unsafe surface
conditions. The important issues addressed are the lateral extent and depth of the affected area, the location of
buried objects and density and moisture variations within and around the unstable mass. Consequently, the
most successful geophysical technologies for detailed characterisation are seismic and electrical resistivity.
Recently these methods have been advanced by improvements to digital acquisition equipment, tomographic
imaging from boreholes and enhanced numerical analysis using personal computers. These advances allow
for development of complex subsurface models that are required at landslide and unstable slope sites.
Case studies demonstrate the application of these advanced geophysical technologies to a variety of landslide
and unstable slope problems. In central Thailand, seismic refraction was applied to delineate an unstable mass
resulting from slump failures in siltstones at a proposed dam abutment. This method, enhanced by seismic ray
tracing, was able to accurately locate the failed rock units. In Western Australia seismic refraction defined a
major boundary fault in weathered granites that exerted controls over sliding failures of steep coal seams during open pit mining. In Malaysia, resistivity mapping located granite boulders and blocks in a failed slope that
were posing hazards to remediation works. In Sydney, Australia seismic imaging from boreholes mapped the
base of an unstable waste landfill.
Advanced geophysical technologies are powerful tools for the detailed characterisation of the complex subsurface conditions at landslides and unstable ground sites and are most effective when fully integrated with
conventional site investigation methods.
1

INTRODUCTION

Once a landslide has developed or when unstable areas exhibit symptoms of past movement and incipient failure site investigations are normally undertaken to establish the factors affecting ground
movement and to determine the appropriate remediation strategies for preventing or minimising future movement. It is widely recognised that landslides and slope instability result from particular
properties of soils, rocks and groundwater, their distribution and interaction. Quantification of these factors can often be achieved by combined application
of direct geotechnical testing and indirect geophysical investigation. Field work at landslides or on potentially unstable ground is difficult and risky. As a
result geophysics is frequently considered to supplement drilling, however, there are widespread concerns that geophysical interpretations cannot

cope with the complexity of subsurface conditions in

these areas due to the apparent simplicity of many
interpretative models.
Geophysically this complexity manifests itself as
rapid variations in seismic velocity and electrical
conductivity created by large changes in the elastic
properties and groundwater conditions within displaced soil and rock masses that occur following
substantial ground movements. These properties
normally contrast strongly with the surrounding materials. As a consequence the geophysical technologies that have been most successful for detailed investigations at unstable sites are seismic and
electrical resistivity (Bogoslavsky and Ogilvy,
1977). These methods have recently been advanced
by improved digital acquisition equipment, the use
of tomographic imaging from boreholes and en-

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hanced numerical data processing algorithms using

personal computers.
The major objective of this paper is to demonstrate, using a variety of case studies, the application
of these advanced geophysical technologies to a variety of landslide and unstable sites where steep
slopes are present.
2

CASE STUDIES

Table 1 lists the sites from which the case studies are
taken, the nature of the instability, the major task for
the geophysical work and the technologies that were
used. These are discussed in the following sections.
Table 1. Geophysical case studies at unstable sites.

Site/
Nature of
Location Instability

Task

Geophysical
Technology

Dam site,
central
Thailand
Open pit
coal mine,
Western
Australia
Road cut,
Penang,
Malaysia

Slump failure
of proposed
abutment
Sliding failures near unstable high
wall
Landslide in
weathered
granite

Map unstable rock

mass
Locate major boundary fault

Seismic
refraction

Electrical
resistivity

Waste
landfill,
Sydney,
Australia

Soil movement on steep

slope

Locate
buried
granite
boulders
Map base
of fill

Seismic
refraction

Borehole seismic
imaging

2.1 Dam Site, central Thailand

During feasibility studies at a dam site on the Kwae
Noi River in Central Thailand an extensive seismic
refraction study was completed (Fell et al, 1992).
This dam is currently under construction. Historic
landslides had occurred on the proposed right abutment due to undercutting of the slope by the river.
Landslide debris at this location produced a highly
irregular ground surface strewn with large sandstone
blocks. The seismic refraction study identified the
shallow low velocity zone associated with this debris. This information and limited drilling led to inference of a rotational slide with a circular failure
surface located close to the river level as shown in
Fig. 1 .
Re-interpretation of the seismic data in this region
(Fig. 2) using seismic ray tracing (Whiteley,1994)
improves definition of the slightly weathered rock
surface and clearly showed the irregular surface of
the displaced and slumped rock masses. The high
Lugeon values obtained near the bottom of the inclined borehole DKN17 (Fig. 1) are located below
the cusp points that represent the upper edges of
slide surfaces between the displaced blocks of siltstone (Fig. 2).
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Figure 1. Seismic section from dam site (from Fell et al. ibid.
Fig. 5.9).

Figure 2. Re-interpreted seismic section from the Kwae Noi

dam site.

2.2 Open Pit Coal Mine,Western Australia

The major coal resources of Western Australia occur
in the intracratonic Collie Basin about 120 km south
of Perth. A major north-south structural feature, the
Muja Fault separates this basin from the Archaean
basement of the Yilgarn Block, and forms the west
wall of the Muja Open Cut coal mine. This area has
long been recognised as being unstable (Joass, 1993)
and various failures have occurred. At this location
the coal sequence abuts the fault with seam dips a
great as 60o due to fault drag. The coal is mined in a
series of 120m wide strips advancing to the north
that are backfilled with spoil as the mining proceeds.
The Fault, itself, is a normal fault dipping at an
average angle of 80o into the basin. Adjacent to the
fault plane is a zone of highly sheared basement rock
consisting of chloritic schists and foliated gneiss.
Beyond the fault zone moderately jointed gneiss is
exposed. The shear zone is believed to represent an
ancient fault zone along which the Muja Fault subsequently acted.

2004 Millpress, Rotterdam, ISBN 90 5966 009 9

As the Muja Fault is concealed at many locations

and has been found to wander, seismic refraction
was chosen to map the fault zone as a lower cost alternative to detailed drilling. Early seismic refraction
work over this fault (Peck and Yu, 1982) showed
that substantial seismic velocity contrasts were present and indicated that the fault could be directly detected as a low velocity zone, however, later seismic
work demonstrated that more reliable indicators of
the fault were lateral structural and velocity variations at the freash and weathered bedrock levels.
Figure 3 shows an interpreted seismic section
across the Muja Fault prior to mining with some of
the seismic data. This section has been verified with
computer ray-tracing and the geology from drilling.

Terubong, Penang Malaysia failed. Large granite

boulders were displaced and there were concerns
that unstable buried boulders might remain in the
area around the failed slope, posing a hazard during
remediation works. The terrain in this region is
highly irregular and natural slope of the hill prior to
the landslide was between 450 and 650. As large
electrical contrasts were expected between the completely weathered granite soils and the fresher less
conductive granite boulders the electrical resistivity
method was used to locate and determine approximate depth of any boulders.
The dipole-dipole sounding/profiling resistivity
method was used along a number of profiles around
the landslip with a dipole spacing of 5 m and n=1 to
5. The steep slopes made it necessary to compute
measured earth resistances to apparent resistivities
using actual electrode positions obtained from survey rather than the standard formula based on a flat
earth model. These apparent resistivities were plotted as Edwards electrical pseudosections at the array
midpoint and the effective or median depth (Edwards, 1977). The effective depth range using this
method was between 2.1 and 7.4m. The apparent resistivity data were also contoured at each effective
depth. This approach was preferred to 2D inversion
(Loke and Barker, 1996) and insufficient data was
obtained to permit accurate 3D inversion.
Figure 4 shows the resistivity profile locations
(S1 to S9) and an apparent resistivity contour plan
around the slide area at an effective depth of 2.1m.
The areas of higher resistivity that have been marked
are interpreted to represent the tops of shallow granite boulder concentrations.

Figure 3. Interpreted seismic section over the Muja Fault

The seismic refraction work accurately mapped

the weathered granitic and sedimentary bedrock
across the fault. Substantial variations in bedrock
levels occur across the fault with a displaced block
of weathered granite correlating with moderately
jointed gneiss extends from the fault zone for about
25 m (from about Ch. 215 to 240 m on Fig. 3).
Movement of this block along the fresh bedrock surface is believed to represent the major source of the
instability that manifests itself as sliding failures in
the coal sequence followed by eventual failure of the
high wall of the mine.
2.3 Road Cut, Penang, Malaysia
In late 1998 a steep slope of weathered granite beside a highway near Sun Moon City at Paya

Figure 4. Apparent resistivity contour plan

Proceedings ISC2 on Geotechnical and Geophysical Site Characterization, Viana da Fonseca & Mayne (eds.)

603

An apparent resistivity pseudosection for Line S8

(Fig.4) is shown on Fig. 5 and Table 2 lists the interpretation of the anomalous resistivity highs on the
pseudo-sections in terms of the presence of boulders
from close to the surface to about 7m depth.

about long stability of the waste and its potential to

pollute the waterway should the slope fail. A key issue was the shape of the quarried rock surface beneath the potentially unstable fill.
Seismic imaging was completed between a pair of
boreholes (BH101 and BH104) along a profile
where surface subsidence had occurred near
BH101.The crosshole imaging was supplemented by
surface-to-borehole imaging either side of these
holes with seismic refraction along the entire profile.
Downhole and surface seismic sources were placed
at 2 to 5 m intervals and the downhole hydrophone
array had detectors at 2 m intervals. Fig. 6 shows the
interpreted seismic incorporating all the seismic data
and calibrated using the borehole logs.

Figure 6. Seismic image of unstable waste fill site.

Figure 5. Apparent resistivity pseudosection with boulder areas

marked.
Table 2. Interpretation of Anomalous Resistivity High Areas

Description

Interpretation

Circular high
enlarging with increasing depth

Multiple complex
highs decreasing
with depth

Large shallow boulder

connected to or in close
proximity with the rock
mass or deeper boulders
Multiple boulders at
shallow depth in
weathered groundmass (grus)

The boulders in area B were considered the most

hazardous. These were exposed and removed prior
to the start of remediation works.
2.4 Waste Landfill, Sydney Australia
Uncontrolled dumping of domestic and building
waste over a long period created an unstable fill site
within an old sandstone quarry, adjacent to a river in
south-western Sydney. The waste was believed to be
at least 20 m thick. Although the site had been
closed for many years and natural vegetation has returned, evidence of continuing instability was evident from visual inspection. There was concern
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This image shows that the waste fill has a very

low seismic velocity that rapidly increases near the
bedrock surface. The rapid shallowing of these velocity contours on the right edge of the image represents the rise to the outcropping sandstone of the old
quarry margin. The bedrock interface is close to the
1900 m/s (1.9 km/s) velocity contour. This contour
indicates that the likely location of buried quarry
benches occurs where the bedrock deepens abruptly
or at distances of 5 m and 24 m from BH 101. The
average bench height from the seismic image is
about 4m.
The combination of limited drilling, installation
of inclinometers and monitoring and this seismic
imaging allowed an improved geotechnical model
for the site to be derived that guided subsequent
monitoring and remedial works.
3

CONCLUSIONS

The application of surface and borehole seismic and

electrical technologies with the latest analysis and
modelling methods provides powerful tools for the
detailed characterisation of the complex subsurface
conditions at landslides and unstable ground sites.
These geophysical methods are able to deal with a
wide variety of problems and are most effective
when fully integrated with conventional methods for
geotechnical site investigation.
2004 Millpress, Rotterdam, ISBN 90 5966 009 9

REFERENCES
Bogoslovsky, V.A. and Ogilvy, A.A., 1977 Application of
geophysical methods for the investigation of landslides.
Geophysics, 42, 562-571.
Edwards, L.S. 1977 A modified pseudosection for resistivity
and IP. Geophysics,42,1020-1036.
Fell, R, MacGregor, P and Stapledon, D. 1992 Geotechnical
Engineering of Embankment Dams. Balkema, Rotterdam,
675p.
Loke, M.H. and Barker, R.D. 1996. Rapid least-squares inversion of apparent resistivity pseudosections by QuasiNewton method. Geophysical Prospecting, 4,131-152.
Peck, W. and Yu, S.M. 1982 Seismic refraction studies for
mine planning and design. Coal Geology 4,2,341-353.
Joass, G.G. 1993 Stability monitoring on the west wall of the
Muja open cut. Geotechnical Instrumentation and Monitoring in Open Pit and Underground Mining, Szwedzicki
(ed.), Balkema Rotterdam, 283-291.
Whiteley, R.J. 1994 Seismic refraction testing a tutorial. in
Geophysical Characterization of Sites ed. R.C. Woods,
ISSMFE, New Delhi, 45-47

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