For a catchment wall for an earth hillside prone to sliding with a 35 to 40 degree slope, how would you normally load the catchment wall for sliding earth?  No large rocks in the matrix, but lots of wet soil and brush/small trees.

Impact factor?
Increased active pressure?
Surcharge load?
Lateral point load at the top of the wall?

Possible project and just trying to see what will most likely be involved in the Geotech's report.

Shotgun answers OK.  Thanks.  

 

Mike McCann
MMC Engineering
http://mmcengineering.tripod.com
 

Impact loading is possible, depending on the type of slides that normally occur.  From your post, I expect that these are relatively small flow type slides.  In that case some impact factor is likely needed, but this is not the type of slide that I deal with very often.

As for the static loads.  If the purpose of the wall is to just temporarily hold the slide debris, not stabilize the slide, then i would use at rest pressures based on the anticipated "pile" of material that will form behind the wall.

If the goal is to stabilize the slide, then I would calculated the load based on the force required to achieve the desired factor of safety.

Hope this helps.

Mike Lambert

Dynamics with a sliding "mass" to establish the force the wall has to withstand?