Experimental modeling of tsunamis generated by subaerial landslides: two case studies of the Three Gorges Reservoir, China

After the Gongjiafang tsunami incident, the China Geological Survey recognized the extreme importance of subaerial landslide-generated tsunamis (SLGT) in the Three Gorges Reservoir, western China. The experimental models presented in the present paper were rooted in two common failure types of high, steep slopes in the Three Gorges Reservoir. One model represents a rigid rock plunging into the water and the other is a granular cluster sliding into the water. A wide range of effective parameters were considered and studied by performing 74 laboratory tests. The effects of bed slope angle, water depth, slide impact velocity, geometry (three-dimensional size of the rigid block and grain size of the granular cluster), and volume on impulse wave characteristics were examined. Slide kinematics and impulsive wave features, such as wave shape, amplitude, run-up, and run-down, were studied and compared. Experiments showed that the failure type of the rock mass plays a key role in SLGT and strongly influences air–fluid–solid interaction. Thus, to forecast SLGT rapidly, the zone of complicated air–solid–fluid interaction can be treated as a “black box” whose output is a water wave with definable characteristics, such as amplitude. Based on the experimental results, two dimensionless equations for the estimation of primary wave maximum amplitude were developed and successfully verified for the two failure types. The study provides basic information needed to forecast tsunamis generated by slopes with the potential to fail in other reservoirs around the world. These data can also be a very useful resource for theoretical analysis or numerical model validation.