Modelling of Landslides: (I) Failure Mechanisms

This paper presents a theoretical and numerical framework to model the initiation mechanisms of catastrophic landslides. The equations describing the coupling between the solid skeleton and the pore fluids are presented following an eulerian approach based on the mixture theory that can provide a unified formulation for both initiation and propagation phases. The system of Partial Differential Equations is then discretized using the classical Galerkin Finite Element Method and neglecting the convective terms. Some applications to localized and diffuse failure will be presented.