The Behaviour of a Reinforced Soil Mattress Spanning a Cavity Modelled in a Geotechnical Centrifuge

Sinkholes can occur on land underlain by dolomite and cause substantial damage to buildings and even loss of life. More than four million people work or reside on dolomite land in South Africa and it is therefore important to be able to construct safely on dolomite land and to minimise the risk of damage to infrastructure and loss of life. Compacted soil mattresses are often used to found structures on areas underlain by dolomite. This study investigated the effect of tensile reinforcement on the behaviour of a soil mattress spanning an underlying water filled cavity designed to impose a cover subsidence sinkhole. Three small-scale models, each consisting of a soil mattress with a cover subsidence sinkhole forming underneath, were constructed and tested in a geotechnical centrifuge. In the first test, an unreinforced soil mattress was tested and in two more tests, reinforced soil mattresses with different reinforcement strengths were tested. The settlement of the unreinforced soil mattress was initially less than that of the reinforced soil mattresses up to the point at which it failed suddenly. Neither of the reinforced soil mattresses failed suddenly, but both experienced large surface settlements that would have led to substantial damage to an overhead structure.