New Stress Reduction Factor for Evaluating Soil Liquefaction in the Coastal Area of Catania (Italy)

• Main Authors: Salvatore Grasso, Maria Rossella Massimino, Maria Stella Vanessa Sammito
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2021-12-01
• Series: Geosciences
• Subjects: liquefaction; site response analyses; simplified analysis methods; shear stress reduction factor
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3263/11/1/12

In this paper, a study concerning the soil liquefaction potential in the city of Catania is presented. The stress-based liquefaction analysis framework for cohesionless soil includes a function that describes fundamental aspects of dynamic site response, i.e. the shear stress reduction coefficient, r_d, which depends on several factors (depth; earthquake and ground motion characteristics; dynamic soil properties).Various relationships of r_d are reported in literature because of the importance of assessment of CSR. Herein, new variations of r_d with depth have been obtained using different deterministic earthquake scenarios as input motion. The relationships are based on large numbers of site response analyses for different site conditions. The new relationships obtained have been used for the evaluation of the liquefaction potential in the area of the Catania Harbour. The liquefaction resistance has been evaluated by the horizontal stress index (K_D) from seismic dilatometer Marchetti tests (SDMTs). Various correlations were developed to estimate the CRR from K_D, expressed in form of CRR-K_Dcurves to differentiate between liquefiable and non-liquefiable zones. In this study three different CRR-K_Dcurves have been used.