Rockfall hazard assessment along a road on the Peloritani Mountains (northeastern Sicily, Italy)

Abstract

Abstract.A hazard assessment has been performed on rock slopes impending over a segment of the Taorminese Road, which connects two popular tourist destinations in northeastern Sicily: the urban centers of Taormina and Castelmola. The road crosses steep rock slopes with a complex geological and tectonic history. The section of the road close to Castelmola is often affected by rockfall phenomena, causing injury to people and serious damage to buildings and traffic. The study analyzes the geostructural setting of the unstable rock masses, by evaluating their mechanical properties and the kinematics of potential failures. Rockfall simulations confirm that falling rocks would involve the Taorminese Road with different kinetic energy rates and prove useful for suggesting the most suitable mitigation technologies for future remedial works. The modified Rockfall Hazard Rating System has been applied to highlight the different levels of hazard along the road. The compiled hazard map shows that portions of the slopes need urgent remedial works, especially because Taorminese is the only access road to Castelmola and its interruption would lead to the isolation of the village.

Rockfall Analysis for Preliminary Hazard Assessment of the Cliff of Taormina Saracen Castle (Sicily)

“…Coefficients of restitutions were retrieved by literature, according to back analysis performed in similar and neighboring contests [8,19,20] (Table 2). Simulations took into account the potential detachment points, mainly identified on site at the highest portions of the cliff, and the presence of widespread blocks previously fallen and stopped along the slope, which are likely to be mobilized giving rise to new rockfall events.…”

“…Several authors proposed risk assessment procedures, applied to peculiar case studies worldwide (e.g., [8,12,[16][17][18][19]). The utility of this kind of study is a zonation of the hazard to set up a strategy management of the faced problems, with particular reference to possible activation of emergency procedures, such as warnings and evacuations.…”

“…Based on the economic and social impact of the expected event, these kinds of studies are crucial for risk management purposes, because they can be employed as a tool to locate and design proper mitigation economic and social impact of the expected event, these kinds of studies are crucial for risk management purposes, because they can be employed as a tool to locate and design proper mitigation measures. To this purpose, several qualitative and quantitative approaches have been proposed in the scientific literature for the evaluation of hazard and risk arising from rockfalls (e.g., [8,[11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21]). Some of these are empirical or semi-empirical methods, which take into account the probability of rock failures, while others involve a statistical analysis of the potential rockfall trajectories and the probability of bad-consequences after the event.…”

Analysis of Potential Rockfalls on a Highway at High Slopes in Cold-Arid Areas (Northwest Xinjiang, China)

“…However, driven by the demand of city building in mountainous areas, research on rockfall attracts more and more attention of domestic and foreign scholars [8,9]. What is more, an increasing number of highway construction projects need the assessment of rockfall hazard to ensure people's lives and property security [10][11][12][13][14]. Literature investigation shows that methods for rockfall analysis can be summarized into three main kinds.…”

Slope stability and rock fall hazard assessment of volcanic tuffs using RPAS and TLS with 2D FEM slope modelling

“…These methods rely on understanding failure mechanisms and on predicting displacement of rock masses (Pappalardo et al 2014, Stead & Wolter 2015, Mateos et al 2016 or at some cases individual rock blocks (Martino & Mazzanti 2014). To gather data on the rock fall hazard of existing cliff faces, a number of crucial data is needed: slope profiles, material properties, block size (De Biagi et al 2017) and possible discontinuity surfaces that can contribute to slope instability.…”