Search Results (35)

According to statistics, between 1954 and 2021, China experienced 3558 dam failures in reservoirs, with flood overtopping accounting for 51.04% of these incidents. Once an earth-rock dam fails, it not only directly threatens the lives and property of surrounding residents and disrupts normal living order, but also damages infrastructure such as farmland, transportation, and power systems, resulting in enormous economic losses. To investigate the mechanisms of overtopping failure and breach evolution in homogeneous earthen embankments during flood seasons, this study conducted seven sets of laboratory model tests with the Changkai Embankment in Fuzhou City, Jiangxi Province, as a prototype. The tests considered various operational conditions, including different crest widths, embankment heights, channel water depths, and river flow velocities. The test results are as follows: Overtopping failure of earth embankments can be categorised into three distinct stages. The breach formation process can be categorised into three stages: vertical erosion (stage I), breach expansion (stage II) and breach stabilisation (stage III). River water levels and inflow rates were identified as pivotal factors influencing the final morphology of the breach and the flow velocity within it. Conversely, the height of the dike was found to have little influence on the shape of the breach and the flow velocity. The breach width ranges from 6 cm to 12 cm. An increase in water depth, corresponding to a greater difference in water levels on both sides of the river, has been observed to result in a deeper breach and faster widening rate. Elevated water levels have been shown to increase the potential energy of the water, which is subsequently converted into greater kinetic energy during breach formation. This, in turn, increases the flow velocity at the breach. However, a negative correlation has been observed between inflow velocity and flow at the breach. This paper combines the material properties of the embankment to discuss the overtopping failure mechanism and the breach evolution law of homogeneous earth embankments. This provides a basis for preventing and controlling embankment failure disasters. Full article

Embankment piping and leakage are primary causes of flood control infrastructure failure, accounting for more than 90% of embankment failures worldwide and posing significant threats to public safety and economic stability. Current manual inspection methods are labor-intensive, hazardous, and inadequate for emergency flood season monitoring, while existing automated approaches using thermal infrared imaging face limitations in cost, weather dependency, and deployment flexibility. This study addresses the critical scientific challenge of developing reliable, cost-effective automated detection systems for embankment safety monitoring using Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV)-based visible light imagery. The fundamental problem lies in extracting subtle textural signatures of piping and leakage from complex embankment surface patterns under varying environmental conditions. To solve this challenge, we propose the Embankment-Frequency Network (EmbFreq-Net), a frequency-enhanced deep learning framework that leverages frequency-domain analysis to amplify hazard-related features while suppressing environmental noise. The architecture integrates dynamic frequency-domain feature extraction, multi-scale attention mechanisms, and lightweight design principles to achieve real-time detection capabilities suitable for emergency deployment and edge computing applications. This approach transforms traditional post-processing workflows into an efficient real-time edge computing solution, significantly improving computational efficiency and enabling immediate on-site hazard assessment. Comprehensive evaluations on a specialized embankment hazard dataset demonstrate that EmbFreq-Net achieves 77.68% mAP@0.5, representing a 4.19 percentage point improvement over state-of-the-art methods, while reducing computational requirements by 27.0% (4.6 vs. 6.3 Giga Floating-Point Operations (GFLOPs)) and model parameters by 21.7% (2.02M vs. 2.58M). These results demonstrate the method’s potential for transforming embankment safety monitoring from reactive manual inspection to proactive automated surveillance, thereby contributing to enhanced flood risk management and infrastructure resilience. Full article

Geological surveys have vital importance at the planning stage of dammed reservoir construction projects. The results of these surveys determine the majority of the technical solutions adopted in the construction design to ensure the proper safety and stability parameters of the structure during water damming. Where the ground type is found to be different from what is expected, the construction project may be delayed or even cancelled. This study analyses issues and design modifications caused by the identification of different soil conditions during the construction of four new flood control reservoirs in the Nysa Kłodzka River basin in south-western Poland. The key findings are as follows: (1) a higher density of exploratory boreholes in areas with potentially fractured rock mass is essential for selecting the appropriate anti-filtration protection; (2) when deciding to apply deep piles, it is reasonable to verify, at the planning stage, whether they can be installed using the given technology directly at the planned site; (3) inaccurate identification of foundation soils under the dam body can lead to significant design modifications—in contrast, a denser borehole grid helps to determine the precise elevation of the base layer, which is essential for reliably estimating the volume of material required for the embankment; (4) in order to correctly assess the soil deposits located, for instance, in the reservoir basin area, it is more effective to use test excavations rather than relying solely on borehole-based investigations—as a last resort, test excavations can be used to supplement the latter. Full article

Alcalá de Ebro is located 35 km northwest of the city of Zaragoza, on the right bank of the Ebro River at the outlet of a ravine (Juan Gastón) towards the river, with a catchment area of more than 230 km². Over time, urbanisation and agricultural development have eliminated the last stretch of the drainage channel, and these water inputs have been channelled underground, filtering through the ground. This section of the Ebro Valley rests on a marly tertiary substratum, which promotes dissolution-subbing processes that can lead to sinkholes. The ground tends to sink gradually or suddenly collapse. Many studies have been carried out to understand not only the origin of the phenomenon but also its geometry and the area affected by it in the town of Alcalá de Ebro. In this sense, it has been possible to model an area around the main access road, where numerous collapsing sinkholes have been found, blocking the road and affecting houses. It also affects the embankment that protects the town from the floods of the river Ebro. These studies have provided specific knowledge, enabling us to evaluate and implement underground consolidation measures, which have shown apparent success. Several injection campaigns have been carried out, initially with expansion resins and finally with columnar development, using special low-mobility mortars to fill and consolidate the undermined areas and prevent new subsidence. These technical solutions propose a method of ground treatment that we believe is novel for this type of geological process. The results have been satisfactory, but it is considered necessary to continue monitoring the situation and to extend attention to a wider area to prevent, as far as possible, new problems of subsidence and collapse. In this sense, the objective is to continue the control and monitoring of possible phenomena related to subsidence problems in the affected area and its immediate surroundings, to detect and, if necessary, anticipate subsidence or collapse phenomena that could affect the body of the embankment. Full article

Climate change has intensified extreme rainfall events, increasing the risk of overflow in agricultural reservoirs originally designed without flood control. This study presents a practical approach for assessing the overflow risk by incorporating both hydrological and structural factors. The key evaluation indicators used for analysis were freeboard (height from the flood level to the embankment level), height from the full water level to the embankment level, inflow–outflow relationship, and flood management capacity relative to the watershed area. Based on the design standards, reservoirs in Jeollanam-do were selected for assessment, and those with a high overflow risk were identified. Rainfall runoff simulations were conducted to evaluate the reservoirs, and the results indicated that considering all four indicators allowed an effective assessment of overflow risk. Multiple regression analysis yielded an R² value of 0.79, suggesting that the relationships among the selected indicators were suitable and had high explanatory power. The findings of this study are expected to provide a practical method for rapidly assessing reservoir overflow risks and developing effective flood response strategies. Full article

To preserve flood control infrastructure, it is essential to quickly detect and accurately identify concealed leakage hazards within embankment projects. In this paper, we propose a novel embankment monitoring method based on the time-lapse transient electromagnetic method and complemented by a theoretical framework for analyzing time-lapse data through the lens of resistivity change rates. A time-lapse model that scrutinizes dynamic response patterns associated with leakage anomalies is constructed, while the efficacy of this methodology is verified through rigorous field experiments. Our research findings reveal a well-defined negative correlation between the resistivity variation rate and the development stage of anomalies. Our proposed method demonstrates enhanced sensitivity in the detection of dynamic evolutionary patterns in latent seepage defects, particularly in low-resistivity environments. Moreover, it successfully delineates both the spatial expansions and electrical property alterations of anomalies, providing a novel technical approach for latent seepage defect monitoring and risk management in embankments. Full article

China’s Dongting Lake area is intertwined with rivers and lakes and possesses many water systems. As such, it is one of the most complicated areas in the Yangtze River Basin, in terms of the complexity of its flood control. Over time, siltation and reclamation in the lake area have greatly weakened the river discharge capacity of the lake area, and whether it can endure extreme floods remains an open question. As there is no effective scenario simulation model for the lake area, this study constructs a hydrological model for the Jingjiang–Dongting Lake system and verifies the model using data from 11 typical floods occurring from 1954 to 2020. The parameters derived from 2020 data reflect the latest hydrological relationship between the lake and the river, while meteorological data from 1954 and 1998 are used as inputs for various scenarios with the aim of evaluating the flood pressure of the lake area, using the water levels at the Chengglingji and Luoshan stations as indicators. The preliminary results demonstrate that the operation of the upstream Three Gorges Dam and flood storage areas cannot completely offset the flood pressure faced by the lake area. Therefore, the reinforcement and raising of embankments should be carried out, in order to cope with potential extreme flood events. The methodology and results of this study have reference value for policy formation, flood control, and assessment and dispatching in similar areas. Full article

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), floods are one of the most important natural disasters in the world, resulting in the severe loss of human lives and intense destruction of infrastructure. The frequent floods in recent decades have caused most parts of Iran to be affected by periodic and destructive floods. Consequently, the casualties and financial losses of floods have increased significantly. The present study aims to investigate redesigning the fuse plug, emergency overflow, and flood system at Ramshir Dam, Iran. In this regard, using a two-dimensional mathematical model, floods with a return period of 10 and 100 years with different scenarios have been investigated. Four scenarios were analyzed, including the current situation, flood channel dredging scenario, flood channel overhaul scenario, and flood channel overhaul scenario with reservoir dredging. The results show the following: (1) The flood channel in its current state cannot even discharge flows lower than the design, i.e., 1400 m³/s, and the flow overflows from the embankments on its sides. (2) Also, the reservoir dredging prevents the failure of the second fuse plug in the 100-year return period (flow rate 4370 m³/s). (3) Discharge more than 2400 m³/s cubic meters led to the activation of the first fuse plug. (4) The present research findings are of particular and essential importance in flood management. (5) The results of this research were based on the rehabilitation and simulation of the diversion dam facilities in the control and conveyance of flood and on three factors of spillway, flood channel, and flood plain, and the correct function of the fuse plug was reviewed. Full article

The soil-based infrastructure is the backbone of the global economy, connecting people, enhancing quality of life, and promoting health and safety. However, its vulnerabilities are becoming apparent due to climate change, mainly through frequent wetting and drying (wd) cycles. Despite few studies in the past, research showing the stability of flood embankments in the long term, incorporating the impact of wetting and drying cycles on the hydromechanical characteristics of soil, is scarce. This study aimed to assess the impact of controlled wd cycles on the hydromechanical properties of clay and silty sand soils and its implications for the stability of a typical flood embankment. Volumetric changes were monitored during the wd cycles. The soil water characteristic curve (SWCC), saturated hydraulic conductivity (k_sat), effective cohesion (c′), and effective angle of internal friction (ϕ′) were measured at 1 and 10 wd cycles. The results indicated that the 10 wd cycles decreased the saturated moisture content and resulted in a flatter SWCC compared to the 1 wd cycle for clayey soil. The k_sat value was also significantly higher at 10 wd cycles than 1 wd cycle for clayey soil. An insignificant difference was found in both the SWCC and k_sat at 1 and 10 wd cycles for silty sand soil. The ϕ′ value for the clayey soil decreased from 28.5 to 20.1 as the wd cycles increased from 1 to 10, while c′ remained unchanged at 10 kN/m². On the other hand, for the silty sand soil, ϕ′ increased from 34.6 to 37.5 with an increase in wd cycles from 1 to 10, and c′ remained constant at 1 kN/m². Numerical modelling of transient water flow coupled with a slope stability analysis revealed that the stability of a flood embankment depends on the evolution of soil hydromechanical properties due to wd cycles and the duration of flooding. These findings underscore the need for proactive measures to mitigate landslide risks in regions prone to frequent wd cycles, thereby ensuring the safety and resilience of slopes and associated infrastructure. Full article

Water is an essential resource for both rural and agricultural areas; it can be wisely distributed and used in the field to protect daily life, production, the natural environment, and the safety and stability of regional drainage and flood control systems. Our research selected a typical plains rural river network area with agriculture as the main industry to investigate the most effective method of farmland diversion and drainage. We comprehensively planned and transformed the water system flow, water conservation engineering, and the ecological environment in the irrigation area through the reutilization system. The reutilization system’s operation and scheduling design is implemented for four specific periods: the water replenishment cycle, agricultural irrigation, agricultural drainage and the rainy period of the flood season. The research period ranges from 2020 to 2023 after the completion of the system. We used monitoring, the recording of hydraulic equipment parameters and data collection to evaluate the balance of water supply and demand in the study area. At the same time, we have tracked and evaluated the four aspects of water quality enhancement, water conservation and flood control, and agricultural irrigation. The results show that the total agricultural water consumption decreased by 2.9%, and the amount of water saved increased by 9.6%. The current segment creates the rivers’ embankment standards. With a 92% irrigation guarantee rate, the current section forms and the embankment standards of the rivers satisfy the design storage volume and the flood level of one in twenty years. The water quality of all the rivers in the area has decreased by 5~10% compared to the average concentration prior to establishment. This study verifies the comprehensive effect and the suitability of the system by comparing the before and after effects, and provides a scientific basis for the method of efficient recycling and utilization of water resources in the rural plains river network area; we also propose the guidance of increasing the digital twin control and long-term operation mechanism to ensure the long-term stable operation of the technology. Full article

Since ancient times, dams have been built to store water, control rivers, and irrigate agricultural land to meet human needs. By the end of the 19th century, hydroelectric power stations arose and extended the purposes of dams. Today, dams can be seen as part of the renewable energy supply infrastructure. The word dam comes from French and is defined in dictionaries using words like strange, dike, and obstacle. In other words, a dam is a structure that stores water and directs it to the desired location, with a dam being built in front of river valleys. Dams built on rivers serve various purposes such as the supply of drinking water, agricultural irrigation, flood control, the supply of industrial water, power generation, recreation, the movement control of solids, and fisheries. Dams can also be built in a catchment area to capture and store the rainwater in arid and semi-arid areas. Dams can be built from concrete or natural materials such as earth and rock. There are various types of dams: embankment dams (earth-fill dams, rock-fill dams, and rock-fill dams with concrete faces) and rigid dams (gravity dams, rolled compacted concrete dams, arch dams, and buttress dams). A gravity dam is a straight wall of stone masonry or earthen material that can withstand the full force of the water pressure. In other words, the pressure of the water transfers the vertical compressive forces and horizontal shear forces to the foundations beneath the dam. The strength of a gravity dam ultimately depends on its weight and the strength of its foundations. Most dams built in ancient times were constructed as gravity dams. An arch dam, on the other hand, has a convex curved surface that faces the water. The forces generated by the water pressure are transferred to the sides of the structure by horizontal lines. The horizontal, normal, and shear forces resist the weight at the edges. When viewed in a horizontal section, an arch dam has a curved shape. This type of dam can also resist water pressure due to its particular shape that allows the transfer of the forces generated by the stored water to the rock foundations. This article takes a detailed look at hydraulic engineering in dams over the millennia. Lessons should be learned from the successful and unsuccessful applications and operations of dams. Water resource managers, policymakers, and stakeholders can use these lessons to achieve sustainable development goals in times of climate change and water crisis. Full article

Serving as a crucial part of the Yangtze River Basin (YRB)’s flood control system, Flood Detention Areas (FDAs) are vital in mitigating large-scale floods. Urbanization has led to the development of urban FDAs, but significant losses could ensue if these FDAs are activated. With improved reservoirs and embankments, flood pressure in the middle reaches has lessened, posing challenges in balancing flood control and economic benefits. This paper presents a comparative analysis of land use, GDP, and population in FDAs and adjacent cities, enhancing our understanding of their disparities and interrelations. Using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP)–Entropy Weight Method (EW)–Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) comprehensive evaluation method, we assess changes in flood control and economic values in FDAs. The results show a conflict between flood control and economic policies in FDAs, highlighting their underestimated economic potential, especially in urban areas. This study identifies differences in economic development across FDAs and a strong correlation between flood control value and inundation rates. Based on evaluations and simulations of the 1954 flood, we provide recommendations for the FDAs’ construction plan, which serves the development and flood management of the YRB and offer insights for similar assessments elsewhere. Full article

This article combines numerical simulation and field monitoring methods to study the stability of the overlying Liuyang River embankment in the tunnel crossing between Huaqiao Station and Rice Museum Station of Changsha Metro’s Line 6. Using AutoCAD, 3Dmine, and COMSOL Multiphysics, a calculation model of the entire subway tunnel section crossing the flood control embankment under the coupling of fluids and solids was established. The process of tunnel-crossing the embankment and the variation in spatial displacement and plastic strain in different geological layers were analyzed from the perspective of time evolution and spatial distribution. The research results show that during the process of crossing the embankment, the deformation of the east bank is greater than that of the west bank, and crossing the west bank is the relatively riskier stage of the entire project. Moreover, during the process of crossing the embankment, the overlying soil layer will produce a plastic strain zone, and only a small amount of plastic strain is generated in the surrounding sandstone layer of the tunnel walls. In terms of the magnitude of plastic strain, the plastic strain area produced by the leading tunnel’s surrounding rocks is larger than that of the following tunnel. As the excavation progresses, a funnel-shaped settlement displacement gradually forms during the passage of the leading tunnel, and this settlement funnel gradually expands during the passage of the following tunnel, with the maximum settlement point transitioning from directly above the leading tunnel to the middle position between the two tunnels. Using the jitter filter algorithm and the adjacent average method to process the field monitoring data, the results show that the monitored deformation results well match the simulated settlement results. Full article

Climate change, one of the severest environmental threats to humankind, disproportionately affects low-income, developing countries in the Global South. Having no feasible mitigation alternatives, these countries resort to adaptation efforts to address climate perturbations. Climate change adaptation (or resilience) is primarily a localized course of action that depends on individuals, social networks, economies, ecologies, political structures, and the capabilities of all those to work collectively to absorb, learn from, and transform in the face of new realities. With a view to controlling the floods that shattered the life and economy of the then East Pakistan, which is now Bangladesh, during the mid-twentieth century, the coastal embankment project (CEP) was instituted as an adaptation strategy to natural disasters in Southwestern Bangladesh. Based on a qualitative analysis of primary and secondary data, this paper seeks to critically evaluate the efficacy of the CEP in terms of the space for feasible action and ecological modernization. The findings of this research indicate that the CEP has become an unrealistic venture that hinders the growing economic activity of shrimp aquaculture in the area. This paper is expected to contribute to generating further theoretical and empirical discourse on the evaluation of similar development projects around the globe. Full article

The dynamically changing world poses new challenges to urbanized areas, e.g., related to water management in the architectural and urban context. Improving retention and strengthening blue-green infrastructure can be based on technical, semi-natural and natural methods, which are less invasive. Various forms are used in the city space: flow control, detention, retention, filtration, infiltration, and treatment. The implementation of the green order strategy and shaping sustainable development in the context of designing the city’s resilience is associated with shaping spatial policy and urban planning assumptions for the transformation of public spaces and new investments in urbanized areas in crisis. The shaping of waterfronts in the city and green and blue infrastructure significantly shape the parameters of the environment and the regenerative capacity of the urban ecosystem. The aim of this work was to show the relationship between the problem of embankments and the possibilities of developing space in their proximity, including areas exposed to the risk of flooding. The relationships determined by the goal were verified in comparative studies, a repeatable method of collecting, processing, analyzing, and interpreting the obtained data was used. The issue was presented in a broader context of flood risk and water management in the area of Lake Zegrze, collisions and spatial conflicts were analyzed. The results are presented in the context of detailed water management data for the complex of Riva Zegrze facilities, which is a model example regarding the sustainable development of areas on embankments, considering their specific floodplain development possibilities. The effects of the research allowed for the formulation of conclusions, including in terms of implementation, in the field of urban and architectural design for areas associated with an embankment. Full article