Abstract
Geophysical and geotechnical data are presented from different sites in eastern Ontario where variable geotechnical properties of Champlain Sea sediments (‘Leda Clays’) are found. Sites range from thick “undisturbed” silts and clays, to “disturbed” geologically similar soils (earthquake triggered landslides and other deformed materials). High-resolution seismic profiles provide stratigraphic context for some of the boreholes drilled in the study area. Downhole geophysical logs from 14 boreholes are compared to core sample measurements of porosity, sensitivity, and porewater conductivity to develop useful empirical relationships. According to these relationships, silt and clay sediments can be sensitive or quick when formation conductivity drops below 100 mS/m. Conversely, silts and clays with elevated conductivities (>250 mS/m) are rarely sensitive. Salinity values calculated from porewater conductivity indicate sensitive or quick behaviour may be expected in leached soils when salinity drops below 2 g/l.
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Acknowledgements
The authors wish to thank Drs. Richard Fortier of Université Laval and Greg Oldenborger of the GSC for their reviews of this paper. We also thank Jan Aylsworth for contributing lab sample results from her studies in the South Nation/Alfred areas, Krystal Aubry for her collation and further study of these results, and Claudia Moore for her porewater extractions and conductivity measurements of the JSR borehole samples. This work was made possible through funding from the GSC’s Public Safety Geoscience, Landslide Hazard Reduction, and Groundwater Geoscience Programs. This work represents ESS contribution number 20120459.
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Crow, H.L., Hunter, J.A., Pugin, A.J.M., Pullan, S.E., Alpay, S., Hinton, M. (2014). Empirical Geophysical/Geotechnical Relationships in the Champlain Sea Sediments of Eastern Ontario. In: L'Heureux, JS., Locat, A., Leroueil, S., Demers, D., Locat, J. (eds) Landslides in Sensitive Clays. Advances in Natural and Technological Hazards Research, vol 36. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7079-9_20
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7079-9_20
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