Evaluating susceptibility of karst dolines (sinkholes) for collapse in Sango, Tennessee, USA

Siska, Peter and Goovaerts, Pierre and Hung, I-Kuai (2016) Evaluating susceptibility of karst dolines (sinkholes) for collapse in Sango, Tennessee, USA. Progress in Physical Geography, 40 (4). pp. 579-597.

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Abstract

Dolines or sinkholes are earth depressions that develop in soluble rocks complexes such as limestone, dolomite, gypsum, anhydrite, and halite; dolines appear in a variety of shapes from nearly circular to complex structures with highly curved perimeters. The occurrence of dolines in the studied karst area is not random; they are the results of geomorphic, hydrologic and chemical processes that have caused partial subsidence, even total collapse of the land surface, when voids and caves are present in the bedrock and the regolith arch overbridging these voids is unstable. In the study area, the majority of collapses occur in the regolith (bedrock cover) that bridges voids in the bedrock. Because these collapsing dolines can damage property and cause even the loss of lives, there is a need to develop methods for evaluating karst hazards; such methods can be used by planners and practitioners for urban and economic development, especially in regions with a growing population. The purpose of this project is threefold: 1) to develop a karst feature database, 2) to investigate critical indicators associated with doline collapse, and 3) to design a doline susceptibility model for potential doline collapse based on external morphometric data. The study revealed the presence of short range spatial dependence in the distribution of the dolines’ morphometric parameters such as circularity, geographic orientation of the main doline axes and the length-to-width doline ratios; therefore, geostatistics can be used to spatially evaluate the susceptibility of the karst area for doline collapse using the probability of occurrence of these critical parameters. The partial susceptibility estimates were combined into final spatial probabilities enabling the identification of areas where undetected dolines may cause significant hazards.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information and Comments:	This is the author's post peer review version of an article, the final version of which is published in the Sage Publications journal Progress in Physical Geography.
Keywords:	Karst, dolines, sinkholes, geostatistics, kriging, doline morphometric parameters, GIS
Faculty / Department:	Faculty of Human and Digital Sciences > School of Computer Science and the Environment
Depositing User:	Mary Rice
Date Deposited:	11 May 2016 09:31
Last Modified:	13 Jan 2025 14:11
URI:	https://hira.hope.ac.uk/id/eprint/928

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