Explores two methods; rainfall thresholding and landslide susceptibility assessment that may be uses in the management of slope instability in landslide prone area

The St. Thomas district of Jamaica is prone to slope failure, which has resulted in extensive damage and in some cases loss of life. To reduce the effect from landslides, there was an urgent need to map and assess areas that may be prone to future failure. The interpretation of aerial photographs, together with geomorphological mapping and field surveys, was used to produce inventory maps of the landslides. The factors conditioning the slopes for failure were assessed and a weighting value was assigned to them. The weighting was achieved by using the principle of Bayesian conditional probability. The weighted factors were combined in a geographical information system (GIS) to produce a landslide susceptibility model for the study area. Comparison of the model with the existing landslides showed that 97% of the landslides fell within the high and very high susceptibility zones of the model. Comparison of the model with landslides that occurred during 2002, and that were not used in the construction of the model, shows that 83 of the 89 slides that occurred fell within the high and very high susceptibility zones. The landslide susceptibility model will be one of the first steps in assessing the risks that landslides pose to lives and new developments (housing, agriculture, physical infrastructure) in the region.

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The purpose of this study was to determine whether corn flake crumbs could replace part or all of the sugar coated corn flakes used to produce compressed fruit flavored corn flake bars. (For further information on these products see military specification MIL-C-35074.) By substituting corn flake crumbs for pulverized sugar-coated corn flakes considerable savings could be realized. For example, based on purchases of 12 million long range patrol packets by the Armed Forces in FY70, of which one quarter contain corn flake bars as a component, at least $60,000 could have been saved. Simple as this sounds, the corn flake crumbs (in bar form) would require comparable storage stability as the pulverized flakes and be able to be compressed to a similar hardness level without brittleness. Test samples were compressed at 2612 pounds per square inch, stored for 9 months at 100°F., and hardness and work measured periodically. In this study it was found that the Instron Universal Testing Apparatus provided objective textural data on corn flake bars heretofore not obtainable by other methods. Results indicated that compressed fruit-flavored corn flake bars prepared from corn flake crumbs were as stable from a sensory and textural standpoint as those prepared from pulverized corn flakes. However, on increased compression pressures, the use of corn flake crumbs resulted in bars that were more brittle. Further research must be done to determine if this problem of increased brittleness associated with the use of corn flake crumbs can be overcome.

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