A STUDY OF SOME RECENT FAILURES OF EARTH DAMS IN INDIA

Abstract

The present dissertation mainly aims at bringing together and discussing available information on some recent earth dam failures in India. While effort has been made to include all different types of failures, the study has had to depend on avail-able or published material. Thus more details have been given for such failures as were enquired into in detail and the reports made public, e.g. the failure of Panshet Dam. For the rest, as much detail as possibly could be collected, has been given. The first three chapters serve as an introduction to the main theme dealing with historic development of earth dam design and causes of earth dam failures in general. Chapter 4 deals with the failure of Panshet Dam which is unique in many respects including the amount of damage caused. Seepage failures of Nanaksagar, Sarda Sagar and other dams are discussed in Chapter 5 while slope failures ana others due to miscellaneous shortcomings in design and construction are consider-ed in Chapter 6. All examples have been taken from Indian dams except, viz. "Waco Dam slide", to.illustrate foundation failure. Earthquake damage or failure to an earth dam has not 'et occurred in India - in any case the problem of seismic stability has been extensively dealt with anywhere and needs separate treatment. Chapter 7 briefly deals with the role of Instrumentation in forewai,,ing against damages to the dam and enabling remedial measures to be taken in time. The preventive measures in general are discussed in Chapter 8. In Chapter 9, the author's conclusions (v) are given in the form of lessons to be learnt from the failures which have occurred. It is hoped that this' studywill be of interest and help to the earth-dam engineers in the country.