Quantitative settlement hazard assessment for a permafrost embankment based on distributed optical fiber monitoring

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Quantitative assessment of the highway settlement hazard in permafrost regions is urgently needed for maintaining the performance of highway service. This study firstly conducted a field monitoring of an embankment located in the permafrost region by performing the distributed fiber optic monitoring. Subsequently, a novel indicator named embankment disease indicator(EDI ε) was developed based on strain gradient calculated through the monitoring results to build a permafrost embankment settlement hazard quantitative assessment framework. The results indicate that, (1) the distributed fiber optic monitoring can reflect the uneven settlement distribution of permafrost embankment over a wide range and long distance; (2) 0.152% is suggested as the strain gradient criterion to calculate EDI ε, EDI ε can quantitatively indicate differential settlement disease rate in permafrost embankment; (3) the model implementation results have a dynamic quantity consistent with the actual situation, the assessment framework is particularly useful for large regional uneven settlement assessment of permafrost embankment.