SANTO DOMINGO. – Families residing within the area where the landslide occurred last Tuesday, on Las Carreras Avenue in Santiago de los Caballeros, must be evacuated immediately and completely because they are at high risk, as the buildings could collapse, warned Tirso Álvarez Fermín, a civil engineer specializing in Geotechnical Engineering, yesterday.
In addition to his main recommendation, which is to relocate all residents, the specialist suggests closing the road until the existing structures are stabilized and "placing a retaining wall with piles of significant moment of inertia to prevent the buildings from collapsing.".
Fourth, it recommends the construction of new retaining walls of adequate cross-section and with appropriate backfill. After exhausting this protocol, it assures that the road can be reopened.
Regarding the possible causes of the wall's collapse, he explains that the retaining wall appears very thin, which, in his opinion, suggests it wasn't designed to withstand the accumulation of water pressure. "It's very slender.".
He adds, “There is no water table and drains were probably left, but the fill material looks very fine, the drains got clogged and water accumulated, which caused the collapse,” notes the PhD expert, a 1997 graduate of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign USA.
He adds that the problem lies in the fact that when the walls fall, the confinement of the building foundations is reduced, and it is possible that these buildings may also move or collapse.
“Therefore, they must be quickly pre-supported with a high inertia wall, a sheet pile wall probably with cast-in-place piles of 80 cm in diameter,” the engineer explained.
The collapse
The incident occurred last Tuesday around 5:00 p.m. due to the rains recorded in the city of Santiago.
The affected wall runs along Las Carreras toward the Monument to the Heroes of the Restoration. Rescuers said they fear the structure on the other side of the avenue, where the Fire Department headquarters and the plaza housing the Santiago Municipal Electoral Board are located, could also collapse.
For more than 10 years, members of the relief agencies had been warning of the danger posed by that wall due to the cracks it had.
Yesterday, Civil Defense and the Ministry of Public Works and Communications (MOPC) took the measure of evacuating the families closest to the landslide, as a preventive measure against the possibility of new rains.
