Slope Stability Analysis Simulation for Riverbanks Using Morgenstern-Price Method

Riverbank collapse was recorded in the Philippines especially during typhoons and heavy rains. To analyze the possibility of failure, Slope/W under the Geostudio package was used as a finite element modeling technique in the study. The simulation determined the effect of the factor of safety (FOS) from the six (6) different assumed slopes and 15 different soil properties. The assumption of the present paper is that the properties of the soil and slope of the riverbank can determine the stability status of the sloping riverbank. There was a total of 90 simulations that were analyzed using the Morgenstern-Price method. The simulation results concluded that the highest and safe values of the factor of safety were recorded in simulations 1, 5 and 12 which are all more than 1.50. The simulations with a lower value of cohesion resulted in a lower value of the factor of safety. The correlation assessment result revealed that the slope instability or failure of slopes of riverbanks can be attributed to the cohesion values and the angle of internal friction (ϕ). It is recommended using a flatter slope and high values of cohesion which can be attained by riverbank improvement. If lower values of cohesion were detected, additional measures like bank stability should be proposed. The measures to be implemented should improve the FOS value which would improve the stability of slopes, thus preventing the vulnerability to riverbank collapse.