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Geotechnical Engineering Histories in Geotechnical Engineering

Jun 1st

Liquefaction During 1988 Earthquakes and a Case

Study
M. K. Gupta
University of Roorkee, Roorkee, India

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 Proceedings: Third International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering, St. Louis, Missouri,
June 1-4, 1993, Paper No. 14.19

Liquefaction During 1988 Earthquakes and a Case Study

M. K. Gupta
Professor of Soil Dynamics, University of Roorkee, Roorkee, India

SYNOPSIS Several parts of north eastern India, Bangladesh and Burma were rocked by an
earthquake on August 6, 1988. The author carried out earthquake damage survey due to
liquefaction in Assam region. Wide spread liquefaction in the area was observed. Guide bunds
and approach roads of a road bridge near tezpur performed excellently against liquefaction
during the earthquake for which they were designed. Another earthquake of magnitude 6.6
visited Nepal Bihar border region which shook northern Bihar and Nepal region and was felt as
far as Jaipur in the west and Shillong in the east. Large scale liquefaction has also been
reported due to this earthquake.

INTRODUCTION EARTHQUAKE OF AUGUST 6, 1988

Liquefaction of saturated sands has often been In early hours of August 6, 1988, a strong
one of the causes of earthquake damage to earthquake originated near Burma India border
structures resulting in loss of the life and and shook several parts of north-eastern and
property. On Augusut 6, 1988, several parts of eastern India. The origin time of this
the north, north-eastern India were rocked by an earthquake was b hours, 36 minutes and 24.6
earthquake. The tremors werP. also felt in seconds ( IST}. The magnitude of the earthquake
Nepal, Bangladesh, Burma and Soviet Union. The was reported to be 6.8 with the duration of
author c.arried out the earthquake damage survey about 2 minutes. The epicentre was located in
due to liquefaction of foundation soil in Assam Burma near Burma-India border region latitude
region during the field visit from August 11 to 25.14 north and longitude 95.125 east.
August 19, 1988. Wide spread catastrophic Figure 1 shows the general map of the area
damage due to liquefaction of embankments, giving location of epicentre and references.
bridges and foundation soil was observed.

On Augusut 21, 1988 another earthquake occurred

on Bihar Nepal Border region. The damage was
reported from areas of Bihar, West-Bengal,
Bhutan and Nepal. The shock was felt at far off
distances such as Tripura, Orissa, Madhya BHUTAN
Pradesh, Rajasthan etc. Department of Earthquake
Engineering, University of Roorkee, Roorkee,
sent a team to Bihar to carry out a damage
survey <Damage Survey Report on the Earthquake}.
Large scale liquefaction has been reported
during this earthquake also.

A road bridge on river Brahmaputra near Tezpur

was constructed recently. Investigations of
foundation soil for its liquefaction
characteristics were carried out by the author.
The foundation soil was prone to liquefaction
for large depths during an earthquake. The
guide bunds and approach roads were designed to
w~thstana the earthquake aga1nst damage due to
liquefaction. Both the guide bunds and the
approach roads withstood the earthquake and an
excellent performance was observed. The
present paper describe the salient features of
damage due to liquefaction in the two
earthquakes and study on perform~nce of road Figure 1 Location of Epicentre August 6, 1988
bridge on River Brahmaputra near Tezpur. Earthquake

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ASSAI'! AREA to have subsided. The building cracked badly
(FigureS>. A pick up van was standing at the
National Highway 37 damaged due to liquefaction time of earthquake. It was reported to the
of soil and slides at several places including authors that the. van sank half in the ground.
Lumding-Diphu section of N.F. railway were
reported. Damage was caused to bridges.
Abutments sank and wooden piles of the bridges BRIDGES
floated up. A private hotel at Silchar suffered
badly due to liquefaction. Few important cases A wooden bridge (bridge No. 6/1) at Kathiatoli
are described here. on Kathiatoli - Kampur Road failed during the
earthquake due to liquefaction. One of the
abutments settled about 2 meters into the river.
NATIONAL HIGHWAY 37 At the same time it was seen that the wooden
piles were uplifted and were touching the deck.
Damage of the road embankment of N.H.37 between
Buwahati and Nagaon was observed due to
liquefaction. The location of the damage was at
255 km near village Rangthali 3 kms from Raha.
Fig. 2 &hows the damage to the embankment.
During the earthquake the toes seems to have
liquefied and the embankment slumped. This
caused longitudinal cracks on the crust and the
slopes.

N.F. RAILWAY TRACK BETWEEN LU"DING AND DIPHU

A portion of the embankment was completely

washed away between Borlongphar and Langchiliet
stations on N.F. Railway. The height of the
embankment at the damaged site was of the order
of Bm. A nala flows near the toe in this
portion. Toe of the embankment seems to have
suffered liquefaction during the earthquake.
And combind with saturated condition of
embankMent due to rains, complete collapse of
embankment took place leaving the track hanging
in air <Figure 3>. Figure 4 shows the Tinsukia
mail standing few meters away from the hanging
track. A major train accident was avoided due Figure 3 Railway Track Near Borlongphar
to alert action of a railway person.

HOTEL REGALE AT SILCHAR

Hotel Regale is a double storey building at

Silchar. The foundation soil was observed to
have liqu~fied. It was reported that sand and
water ejected out during the earthquake and
fountains of the order of 60 ems high were
observed. The floors of the rooms were observed

Figure 2 Slumping of Embankment Figure 4 Tinsukia "ail Escaped Disaster

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 In the belt covering Darbhanga, Laheriasarai,
Madhubani and Jhanjharpur; sand water geysers
rising to a height of about 1 to 2m were
reported. Sand and Water vents were seen in
open areas and floors of buildings cracked with
water and sand oozing out of the cracks,
buildings and boundary walls sank and cracked.
Road embankments were reported to have cracked
at many places with sand and water gushing out.
Large number of hand tube wells have choked due
to this earthquake. Some of the details are
given in following sections.

JAIL BUILDING DARBHANGA

Liquefaction occured in Darbhanga Jail Complex.

The sand and water fountains rising to a height
of about 2m were observed resulting in cracking
of nearby floor. Also liquefaction appears to
be responsible for the cracking of the brick
boundary wall which was strengthened after the
earthquake of 1934.

Hotel Regale Daage due to WATER TANK DARBHANGA

Figure 5
Liquefaction of soil
The circular water tank 6.5m in diameter and 17m
high is resting on 50 em thick circular raft.
The water tank showed apparantly no damage. The
EARTHOUAKE OF AUGUSUT 21 , 1988 shaft showed circumferential cracks all round
the base passing through the door. The structure
A strong earthquake occurred in the early hours appeared to have been tilted on one side. The
of Augusut 21, 1988 on Bihar Nepal Border. The liquefaction near the tank seems to have
origin time of the earthquake was 4 Hrs 39 occurred but due to flood water it could not be
minutes 11 second CIST>. The magnitude has been ascertained.
reported to be 6.6 with its epicentre clo~e to
Bihar-Nepal Border. Longitude 86.609 E,
Latitude 26.775 N. In the epicentral track the DAMAGE IN LADHANIA
earthquake was accompanied with noise and was
felt in two shock waves of 10 to 15 seconds The Ladhania block is located about 70 km north
duration. This earthquake caused widespread east of "adhubani. Sand and Water erupted like
devastation and loss of life, killing about 280 a volcano to a height of about 2m. The nearby
people in Bihar and about 650 people in Nepal building damaged. The floors bursted and the
and injurring about 3770 people. Extensive doors could not be opened due to uneven
evidence of liquefaction has been reported from settlement of floor. Many wells were observed
areas near Darbhanga, Laheriasarai, Madhubani to have filled with sand after the earthquake.
and Jhanjharpur. Figure 6 shows the general map
of area giving the epicentre and references.
DAMAGE TO LIFE LINES AND EMBANKI'IENTS

Sinking of railway track caused by ground

subsidence was reported in Saharsa- "adhepura
section. The river embankment over Butahibalan
in Madhubani district and embankments of river
Koshi developed longitudinal cracks caused due
to liquefaction.

PERFORMANCE OF GUIDE BUNDS AND APPROACH ROAD

E"BANKI'tENTS

A road birgde was constructed across the river

Bra~aputra near Tezpur in Assam. Sub soil
investigations at the bridge site were carried
out by Asia Foundations and Construction Private
Ltd. Bombay. The right abut.snt of the bridge
is founded on sound rock, while on the left
bank, the site consists of saturated loose
alluvial deposits extending to about 15
J4~,----~--~
.~.----~--.~.----._---,7 ____.____.,,J4 depth. The deposits on left bank are prone to
liquefaction during an expected earthquake. The
liquefaction study of the project was carried
Figure 6 Location of Epicentre August 21, 1988 out in 1980- 81 at Departent of Earthquake
Earthquake Engineering, University of Roorkee, Roorkee.

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It has been understood that the development of
liquefaction is progressive in nature.
Liquefaction of a layer in first few cycles of
an earthquake reduces the overburden pressure on
the underlying layers. This may cause
liquefaction in the underlying layer in next few
cycles of earthquake motion thereby further
reducing the overburden pressure in lower
layers. In this way liquefaction may travel to
sufficient deep layers. A method has been

..~ '
developed by Prakash and Gupta, which uses the
laboratory test data obtained from vibration :z:
table tests conducted on soil sample obtained A.
from site.
porepressure
The test data is plotted giving
rise vs initial effective
"'
oa
overburden pressure for different relative
densities at different accelerations. The
analysis take care of the progressive nature of
liquefaction <Gupta, 1977, Prakash and Gupta,
1986}. 12

Liquefaction possibility was determined for the 14~---=~--~~--~~---=~---=~--~~--~

bridge site using this method. The vibration 0 20 0 400 600 800 1000 1200
table tests were conducted on soil sample PORE PRESSURE RISE-sjcm2
obtained from the site. This study indicate
that during an expected earthquake the soil
layers in about 15 m depth would liqeufy <Figure
7} a2d a dense effective overburden of about 500 Figure 8 Liquefaction Analysis of Soil Deposit
g/cm may make the deposit safe against With 5 m Dense Overburden
liquefaction <Figur-e 6}. Based on this
information the guide bund and approach road
embankments were designed with suitable berms.
Figure 9 shows a typical section of the
embankment.

RELATIVE OENSI TV

t---12. 5 m ---t-o---12. 5 m------i

EFFECTIVE OVERBURDEN- Sm COMPACTED

GROUND ~OTION 120 CYCLES

DETAILS AT 'A'
5/og
I 5"/og
10/o !I
10
10
20
.
',

sJ. g 80
"
" Figure 9 Typical Section of Approach Road

e
'
r \

...:z:
A.
' \' LIOIJEFIED
During the earthquake of Aug. 6, 1988, the road
'\
"'
0
10 '
'
embankment and
satisfactorily.
guide bunds performed

14
12

PORE PRESSURE RISE AFTER

1'\\'CYCLkS
CONCUSIONS

Wide spread liquefaction of foundation soil has

10 20 been observed during the earthquakes of August
6, 1988 and August 21, 1988. In the ev~nt of
18 o~~-20L-0~-4~0-0~-,~0-0L-~~~OL-~~~OL-~Iw2~00L-~14LO~O~I~&OO liquefaction of foundation soil no extra safety
in design of structures is of any help. It is,
PORE PRESSURE RISE -gjcrn2
therefore, extremly important to cary out the
liquefaction investigations for foundation soils
prone to liquefaction and provide the necessary
igure 7 Liquefaction Analysis of Soil Deposit
remedial measures i f necessary.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The field visit for the earthquake damage survey
was supported by the Department of Earthquake
Engineering, University of Roorkee.

REFERENCES
Gupta, M.K. ( 1977>, "liquefaction of Sand during
Earthquakes", Ph.D. Thesis, University of
Roorkee.

Gupta, M.K. and S. Prakash (1986J, "A new

Realistic Approach for Liquefaction Analysis",
Bulletin Indian Society of Earthquake
Technology, Vol.23, no.3, Sept.1986.

Liquefaction Studies for Brahmaputa Bridge Near

Tezpur, Assam", Earthquake Engineering Studies
EG 80-18, Department of Earthquake Engineering,
University of Roorkee, Roorkee, India, 1980.

Damage Survey Report on Bihar-Nepal Earthquake

of August 2l., 1988, Department of Earthquake
Engineering, University of Roorkee, Roorkee,
India

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