Effect of availability of levee data in the estimation of the probability of levee failure in case of piping
Maurizio Mazzoleni, Stefano Barontini, Roberto Ranzi, Luigia Brandimarte
Monday 29 june 2015
15:20 - 15:35h
at North America (level 0)
Themes: (T) Flood risk management and adaptation, (ST) Adaptation measures
Parallel session: 2I. Floodrisk - Adaptation
The objective of this study is to demonstrate how different scenarios of data availability, such as geometrical levee characteristics, along the main river channel can affect the proper estimation of the probability of levee failure and the consequent breach location. In order to achieve the previous objective a four steps methodology was applied. Firstly, a reliability function based on the relation between resistance and loading conditions was implemented according to the given failure mechanism. Secondly, the fragility curve was assessed using MonteCarlo and First Order Reliability Method approaches. Then, the estimated fragility curves were classified in different fragility classes according the main statistical characteristics of the fragility curves itself. Finally, different scenarios of data availability, expressed in terms of levee width, were assumed. The proposed methodology was applied on the Po river basin, Italy, between the gauged section of Cremona (upstream) and Borgoforte (downstream). In this study, based on a statistical analysis of historical levee failure records piping was considered as main failure mechanism. The results of this study showed how different availability of levee data can affect the proper estimation of the probability of failure and the consequent identification of spatial location of possible breaches
