Went to a really interesting lecture last night by Prof Luis de Mello from Sao Paulo, Brazil. The occasion was the annual Jennings Lecture of the Geotechnical Technical Division of SAICE, and Prof de Mello was especially invited and sponsored to come and speak. The topic was Geotechnical Failures.... Scary stuff!!!
He covered 4 failures - A landslide adjacent to a high altitude road through the jungle (big problems at the road operations and maintenance company had signed in the contract that there would NEVER be any disruption to traffic); variable movement un columns supporting a highway viaduct; a tunnelling collapse in Czech Republic; and a spectacular rock slide (with amazing sequence of photographs) when an abutment failed during the construction of the Itapebi dam.
The lecture was a marathon of more than 2 hours, but was extremely interesting - although the technical geotech stuff went way over my head... stereoplots, etc...) and I think it was generally appreciated by the large turnout from the Geotech fraternity. Prof de Mello's father had delivered a paper at a conference in Durban in 1975, and many of the more senior engineers and geologists (Prof Knight, Prof Maud, Prof Everitt, Prof Schreiner, etc...) had come especially to see if he lived up to his dad's reputation!!!
The lecture was a marathon of more than 2 hours, but was extremely interesting - although the technical geotech stuff went way over my head... stereoplots, etc...) and I think it was generally appreciated by the large turnout from the Geotech fraternity. Prof de Mello's father had delivered a paper at a conference in Durban in 1975, and many of the more senior engineers and geologists (Prof Knight, Prof Maud, Prof Everitt, Prof Schreiner, etc...) had come especially to see if he lived up to his dad's reputation!!!
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