Publication

Abstract : Rock fall hazards pose a significant danger to human lives. Being the most abundant among the slope failures in an earthquake event, rock falls are one of the most destructive co-seismic events. A recent earthquake in Taiwan (Mw 6.1) on April 18, 2019, has been analyzed, and artificial accelerograms were generated using SeismoArtif software. In preserving the site properties, the Chi-Chi earthquake accelerogram was used to match the spectral envelope. Data of rock fall during earthquake in the Zhongbu cross island highway in the Hualien County was collected from a dash-cam recording of the event. This rock fall was modeled in 2-D using the ‘Rockfall’ software by Rocscience, and the number of rocks with respect to the rotational energy of the modeled rock was studied. The artificial accelerogram was used as an input to the predictive model, and the results predicted the Newmark’s displacements. It was found that the predicted displacement values were significant enough to trigger the rock fall but the topography as observed by simulation has aided in the propagation of the rock fall.