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ISSMGE Bulletin
Volume 9, Issue 2
April 2015
International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering
If the quality of the distributed file is not satisfactory for you, please access ISSMGE website and download an electronic version.
www.issmge.org
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Select all items below
1 Message from the President
4 Research Highlights
 Norwegian Geotechnical Institute (NGI)
17 TC Corner
 TC10 – Seismic cone downhole procedure to
measure shear wave velocity: A guideline
 TC19 – Asian Technical Committee (ATC):
Workshop on Geo-Heritage
32 Conference report
 The 6th International Geotechnical Symposium on
Disaster Mitigation in Special Geo-environmental
Conditions
35 Report from an ISSMGE Foundations Recipient
th
 The 30 International Conference on Solid Waste
Technology and Management
36 Hot News
 Announcement from Whittles Publishing
 International Course on Geotechnical and
Structural Monitoring
38 Event Diary
45 Corporate Associates
48 Foundation Donors
EDITORIAL BOARD
Frank, Roger (Ex-officio)
Gomes, Antonio Topa (Editor for Europe)
Gonzalez, Marcelo (Editor for South America)
Leung, Anthony Kwan (Editor for Europe)
Ng, Charles Wang Wai (Editor-in-Chief)
Ooi, Teik Aun (Editor for Asia)
Rujikiatkamjorn, Cholachat (Editor for Australasia)
Sanchez, Marcelo (Editor for North America)
Sfriso, Alejo O (Editor for South America)
Take, Andy (Editor for North America)
Taylor, Neil (Ex-officio)
Message from the President
Dear Members of ISSMGE,
Dear Colleagues,
The last time I wrote directly to you in these columns about
some of the activities of the ISSMGE was in June 2014.
Many things have progressed since and you may be aware of
some of them through your Member Society and/or through the
activity of Technical Committees (TCs) to which you belong.
The Board of ISSMGE met in Goiânia in September 2014, hosted
by the Brazilian Geotechnical Society (ABMS) and in Wellington
in February 2015, hosted by the New Zealand Geotechnical
Society (NZGS), on the occasion of the 12th Australia and New
Zealand Conference on Geomechanics. The 6 Board Level
Committees (BLCs), AWAC, CAPG, IDC, PIC, TOC and YMPG,
have also held a number of meetings, usually by
teleconferences. The Chairs of the 6 BLCs were present or
represented at our Board meetings.
2015 is an important year. It is the mid-term for the President
and also for the ISSMGE cycle! Indeed, we shall have this year
the 5 Regional Conferences on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical
Engineering, midway between the International Conferences of
Paris (2013) and Seoul (2017).
It is also the year where we have our mid-term ISSMGE Council
meeting at which the 89 Member Societies will meet together!
It will be held in Edinburgh on the 13 th September 2015, hosted
by the British Geotechnical Association, on the occasion of the
European Regional Conference.
ISSMGE Bulletin: Volume 9, Issue 2
Page 2
Message from the President (Con’t)
The 5 Regional Conferences, themes, locations and dates are as follows:
(1) Australasia:
The 12th Australia and New Zealand Conference on Geomechanics – The Changing Face of the Earth: GeoProcesses & Human Accelerations, Wellington, New Zealand, 22 nd – 25th February 2015
(2) Africa:
The XVI African Regional Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering - Innovative
Geotechnics for Africa, Hammamet, Tunisia, 27th – 30th April 2015
(3) Europe:
The XVI European Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering - Geotechnical Engineering
for Infrastructure and Development, Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom, 13th – 17th September 2015
(4) Asia:
The 15th Asian Regional Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering - New Innovations and
Sustainability, Fukuoka, Kyushu, Japan, 9th – 13th November 2015.
(5) North and South America:
The XV Pan American Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering, Buenos Aires, Argentina,
15th – 18th November 2015
I do hope that many of you will be able to attend the Conference in your region and/or have been able to
submit a written contribution.
Obviously, many other Conferences, Symposia and events will take place (or have taken place) at National,
Regional and International levels organised by the Members Societies of the ISSMGE. For more information,
please go through the ‘Event Diary’ which is published on the ISSMGE Website and in each issue of the
ISSMGE Bulletin. Some of these events are reported in the Bulletin.
Among the many activities of the ISSMGE, I would like at this time to update you on Technical Committees
and the ISSMGE Webinars, both of which were mentioned previously in my message of June 2014 (see:
http://www.issmge.org/en/the-society/the-president/messages-from-the-president/656-message-fromthe-president).
The Guidelines for ISSMGE TCs and ISSMGE Honour Lectures were finalised in February by the TOC (Chair:
Pierre
Delage),
approved
by
the
Board
and
are
now
published
(see:
http://www.issmge.org/en/committees/technical-committees). They confirm that the activities of the
TCs and the TC Chairs continue their work independently of the term of the ISSMGE Presidency. The
Guidelines deal with the composition of the TCs and other matters for the creation, maintenance and
dissolution of the TCs.
It is also important to note that the database of TC membership is now available and that the TCs’ Chairs
and the Member Societies must use it in order to appoint or reappoint their members. They were informed
of the creation of this database in October 2014 although a number of Member Societies have yet to
upload the names of their TC members. From now on, this system will be the only mechanism of
nominating TC members and it will allow the Member Societies to change their TC members with no delay.
ISSMGE Bulletin: Volume 9, Issue 2
Page 3
Message from the President (Con’t)
With the help of the IDC (Chair: Dimitrios Zekkos) and the company Geoengineer.org, a new series of
ISSMGE Webinars has been implemented and is now running smoothly. The information for the launch of
each ISSMGE webinar, which is delivered approximately every two months, appears on the ISSMGE website
and is also sent to your Member Society for them to circulate. So far, in the new series, we have had 4
webinars:




“In situ testing in geomechanics: Questioning current engineering practice”, by Prof. Fernando
Schnaid (Brazil), October 2014
“Geotechnical Aspects of Peats”, by Dr Cor Zwanenburg (The Netherlands), December 2014
“Introduction to Cone Penetration Testing”, by Prof. Peter Robertson (USA), February 2015
“Impacts of Liquefaction in the 2010-2011 Christchurch Earthquakes”, by Prof. Misko Cubrinovski
(New Zealand), April 2015
I am truly grateful to the lecturers who thus accept to share their knowledge with all of us and devote
their time to the ISSMGE. All presentations are available on our website together with the Q & A session
which follows (see: http://www.issmge.org/en/resources/recorded-webinars). And more are to come …
If you are interested in other activities, please do not hesitate to check the ISSMGE website, in particular
the pages implemented by the corresponding BLC.
I look forward to meeting and chatting with many of you at our upcoming Regional Conferences, in
Hammamet, Edinburgh, Fukuoka or Buenos Aires!
Do not hesitate to write to any one of us, the Board members or the BLC Chairs, if you wish to clarify
something or if you wish to raise a question about ISSMGE and its governance!
Roger Frank
Paris, 18th April 2015