Abstract
The centrifugal model test system is utilized to reappear the breaching process of a tailings dam. The results show that there are significant differences in breaching processes between tailings dams and earth‐rockfill dams. Influenced by the special physical and mechanical properties of tailings, the breaching processes of tailings dams are of short duration, and the flood flow through the breach increase rapidly. Based on the centrifugal test results, considering the special physical and mechanical properties of tailings, a mathematical model for tailings dam breaching is established. In the model, the vertical undercutting and horizontal expansion are simulated utilizing the erosion rate formula which is derived from shear stress principle of water flow; limit equilibrium method is used to analyze the breach slope stability. In addition, the model adopts iterative calculation method to simulate the whole breaching process. The analysis results show that, the proposed model is applicable in modeling the dam breaching process for tailings dam due to overtopping.
Highlights
Tailings dams are the places for storing discarded tailings, which are usually formed by damming the valley
Comparing to the measured data, the peak breach flow calculated using the numerical model has increased by 6.07%, the time to peak flow has decreased by 4.62%, the top width of the final breach has increased by 2.33%, and the bottom width of the final breach has increased by 3.4% (Table 2)
Comparing to the measured data, the peak breach flow calculated using the numerical model has increased by 2.99%, the time to peak flow has increased by 6.43%, the top width of the final breach has increased by 5.16%, and the bottom width of the final breach has decreased by 3.04% (Table 2)
Summary
Tailings dams are the places for storing discarded tailings, which are usually formed by damming the valley. By the end of 2015, 8869 tailings dams were scattered all over China Among these tailings dams, the number of upstream tailings dams is up to 1425 [1]. To reduce consequences of the tailings dam breaching, many scholars have carried out studies on the breaching process of tailings dams and achieved some results [8,9,10,11,12,13]. These studies still use the research methods applied in earth-rockfill dams, which cannot accurately reflect the particularity of tailings dams. Due to the lack of the simulation method agreed with the special physical and mechanical properties of tailings, the lose evaluation of tailings dam breaching and the proposal of emergency plan are short of reliable evidence. ese weak points seriously restrict the advancement of disaster prevention and mitigation level of tailings dams. erefore, it is necessary to study the breaching mechanism of tailings dams due to overtopping for revealing the failure law of them
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