Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94

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Engineering Structures
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/engstruct

XFEM based seismic potential failure mode analysis of concrete gravity

dam–water–foundation systems through incremental dynamic analysis
Gaohui Wang a,b,⇑, Yongxiang Wang c, Wenbo Lu a,b, Chuangbing Zhou a,b, Ming Chen a,b, Peng Yan a,b
a
State Key Laboratory of Water Resources and Hydropower Engineering Science, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
b
Key Laboratory of Rock Mechanics in Hydraulic Structural Engineering Ministry of Education, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
c
Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: As revealed by the structural damage of concrete dams (e.g. Hsinfengkiang, Koyna, Sefid-Rud) arising in
Received 26 October 2014 recent earthquakes, cracking damage would probably occur inside concrete dams when subjected to
Revised 2 April 2015 strong ground motions. This phenomenon is caused by the low tensile resistance of concrete. Research
Accepted 11 April 2015
on the cracking damage process and failure modes of concrete gravity dams subjected to strong earth-
Available online 2 May 2015
quakes is crucial to a reasonable assessment of the seismic safety of dams. In this paper, the extended
finite element method (XFEM) is presented to describe the crack propagation within concrete gravity
Keywords:
dams subjected to earthquake loads. Moreover, the interaction between the impounded water and the
Concrete gravity dam
Extended finite element method (XFEM)
dam–foundation system is explicitly taken into account by modeling the reservoir water with two-
Cracking damage process dimensional fluid finite elements in the Lagrangian formulation. In order to validate the proposed
Potential failure mode algorithm, seismic crack analysis is performed to investigate the failure modes of the Koyna dam–
Incremental dynamic analysis (IDA) reservoir–foundation system under the 1967 Koyna earthquake. It shows that the cracking damage pro-
Dam–reservoir–foundation interaction file obtained from the proposed XFEM framework agrees well with that reported in the literature. With
the validated algorithm, we further apply it to study the potential failure modes of the Guandi concrete
gravity dam. Seismic cracking response of concrete gravity dams considering the effects of the dam–
reservoir–foundation interaction is obtained through the incremental dynamic analysis (IDA) based
XFEM. 40 as-recorded accelerograms with each scaled to 8 increasing intensity levels are selected in this
study. Based on the 320 numerical simulation results, typical failure processes and five potential failure
modes of concrete gravity dams under the selected database of strong earthquake ground motions are
presented.
Ó 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction world, only some of them have experienced ground shaking

Due to the outburst of strong earthquakes like Wenchuan earth-
quake in 2008, Haiti earthquake in 2010, Tohoku earthquake in
2011, and Chile earthquake in 2014, it seems that the earth has
come into an era with more and stronger earthquakes. When sub-
jected to strong ground motions, mass concrete dams are likely to
experience cracking due to the low tensile resistance of concrete.
Meanwhile, the potential crack initiation and propagation would
adversely affect the static and dynamic performance of dams. As
cracks penetrate deep inside a dam, its structural resistance may
be considerably weakened, thereby endangering the safety of the
dam. While there are many high concrete dams throughout the
⇑ Corresponding author at: State Key Laboratory of Water Resources and
Hydropower Engineering Science, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China. Tel.:
+86 027 68772221; fax: +86 027 68772310.
E-mail address: wanggaohui@whu.edu.cn (G. Wang).
induced structural damage. To name just a few, the Hsingfengkiang
dam, China, 1962; Koyna dam, India, 1967; and Sefid-Rud dam,
Iran, 1990 are the ones that have suffered from damage in
earthquakes.
In order to meet the ever increasing demand for power, irriga-
tion, drinking water, etc., numerous high concrete dams are being
built or to be built and the majority of them are located in active
seismic regions. Considering that the possible dam failure due to
seismic activities could result in heavy loss of human life and sub-
stantial property damages, seismic safety evaluation of high dams
remains a crucial problem in dam construction. To achieve a rea-
sonable assessment of the seismic safety of dams, study on the
cracking damage process and potential failure modes of concrete
dams subjected to strong earthquakes is indispensable and
deserves more investigation and attention, which will be the major
focus of this contribution.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.engstruct.2015.04.023
0141-0296/Ó 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
82 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94
The shaking table test, which can reproduce the seismic
response of structures to seismic loadings, is one method to inves-
tigate the seismic failure process of high concrete dams. However,
many issues need to be clarified for the model test. Among them,
the problem of similarity relation is the most difficult, particularly
for the seismic failure process of high concrete dams. Apart from
the shaking table test, many nonlinear models have also been
developed in order to assess the seismic safety of concrete dams.
There are based either on the discrete crack approach [1–4] or
the smeared crack approach [5–8]. In addition, other models, such
as plastic-damage model, extended finite element method (XFEM),
discrete element method (DEM), and discontinuous deformation
analysis (DDA), are also used in some cases to analyze the seismic
failure behavior of concrete dams.
Without being exhaustive, some contributions to these methods
and their applications in seismic analysis of concrete dams are
worth mentioning. Lee and Fenves [9] developed a new plastic-
damage constitutive model for earthquake analysis of concrete
dams. By using this plastic-damage model, Long et al. [10] investi-
gated the seismic damage mechanics of a high gravity dam with
and without the presence of reinforcement. Calayir and Karaton
[11,12] presented a continuum damage model and a co-axial rotat-
ing crack model for earthquake damage response analysis of con-
crete gravity dams with the effects of dam–reservoir interaction
considered. Zhang et al. [13,14] investigated the influences of
strong motion duration and mainshock–aftershock seismic
sequences on the accumulated damage of concrete gravity dams
using a concrete damage plasticity (CDP) model. Omidi et al. [15]
examined the seismic fracture responses of concrete gravity dams
due to constant and damage-dependent damping mechanisms.
They used a plastic-damage model to simulate the irreversible
damage occurring in the fracturing process of concrete. Pan et al.
[16] compared the cracking process and profiles of concrete dams
using the XFEM with cohesive constitutive relations, crack band
finite element method with plastic-damage relations, and the finite
element Drucker–Prager Elasto-plastic model. Zhang and his co-
workers [17] presented the XFEM for analyzing the seismic crack
propagation of concrete gravity dams with initial cracks at the
upstream and downstream faces. Zhong et al. [18] extended the
Rock Failure Process Analysis (RFPA) to study the failure process
of high concrete dams subjected to strong earthquakes. They pre-
sented the typical failure process and failure modes of concrete
gravity dams considering the uncertainty in ground motion input
and concrete material. Pekau and Yuzhu [19] used the DEM to study
the seismic behavior of the fractured Koyna dam during earth-
quakes. Their results showed that the safety of the dam is ensured
if the crack shape is horizontal or upstream-sloped, and it is very
dangerous if the crack slopes downstream. Bretas et al. [20] devel-
oped the DEM to investigate failure mechanisms in masonry gravity
dams. Mirzayee et al. [21] proposed a hybrid distinct element–
boundary element approach to model the nonlinear seismic behav-
ior of cracked concrete gravity dams considering dam–reservoir
interaction effects. Wang et al. [22] employed the DDA to study
the seismic stability of the upper part of the fractured Koyna dam.
Das and Cleary [23] explored a mesh-free particle method called
smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) for the modeling of gravity
dam failure subjected to fluctuating dynamic earthquake loads.
Although all the aforementioned research investigated the fail-
ure process of dams under some specific seismic ground excita-
tions, only a quite limited number of them have been performed
to generalize the seismic failure modes of concrete dams, espe-
cially from a large and reliable database of ground motions. In this
contribution, we analyze the complicated seismic failure process of
the Guandi concrete dam located in China, which involves lots of
mechanisms such as elastic deformation and initiation and propa-
gation of cracks leading to ultimate failure. The XFEM, which was
originally proposed by Belytschko and Black in 1999 [24], is
employed to investigate the nonlinear dynamic behavior of con-
crete gravity dams. Moreover, the cohesive segments method
[25] in conjunction with the phantom node technique [26,27] is
introduced to the XFEM framework in order to simulate crack ini-
tiation and propagation along arbitrary paths, This strategy pro-
vides great flexibility and versatility in the numerical modeling
of discontinuities, since the finite element mesh conforming to
cracks is not required and the remeshing during crack growth is
avoided in this strategy. These advantages are attributed to the
enrichment functions added to the standard finite element approx-
imation, which is based on the partition of unity concept. Further-
more, the interaction between the impounded water and the dam–
foundation system is also explicitly taken into account by model-
ing the reservoir water with two-dimensional fluid finite elements
in the Lagrangian formulation. That is to say, the presented XFEM
framework is applied in the fluid–solid coupled systems for solid
(concrete dam) modeling.
More importantly, the presented study also attempts to gener-
alize the potential failure modes of concrete gravity dams from a
large database of ground motions. Considering the uncertainty in
ground motion input, 40 as-recorded accelerograms with each
scaled to 8 increasing intensity levels are selected as seismic exci-
tations. Seismic cracking damage process and dynamic response of
concrete gravity dams including the effect of dam–reservoir–foun-
dation interaction are simulated through the IDA [28–30] based
XFEM. The typical failure process and potential failure modes of
concrete gravity dams under strong earthquake ground motions
are presented.
2. Extended finite element method for dynamic crack analysis
In the standard FEM, cracks are required to follow element
edges for the discontinuity modeling. In contrast, the crack geom-
etry in the extended finite element method (XFEM) need not be
aligned with the element edges and thus is independent of the
background mesh. Such a independence is made by enriching the
standard displacement-based finite element approximation with
some pre-knowledge of the physics of crack. It is based on the par-
tition of unity method (PUM) introduced by Melenk and Babuška
[31], which allows local enrichment functions to be easily incorpo-
rated into a finite element approximation. This enrichment func-
tions typically consist of some near-tip asymptotic functions that
capture the singularity around the crack tip and a discontinuous
function that represents the jump in displacement across the crack
surface. By implementing the generalized Heaviside function [32],
the method was further enhanced, avoiding taking into account the
complicated mapping for arbitrary curved cracks.
2.1. The XFEM approximation
The XFEM enriches a standard displacement based finite ele-
ment approximation with discontinuous functions. The approxi-
mation for a displacement vector function u with the partition of
unity enrichment (Fig. 1) in the XFEM takes the following form
[32]:
X X
uxfem ðxÞ ¼ ui Ni ðxÞ þ b N ðxÞHðxÞ
j2J j j
i2I |fflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflffl{zfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflffl}
only Heaviside nodes
X X4  X X4 
þ k2K 1 k
N ðxÞ cl1 F ðxÞ þ
l¼1 k l1 k2K 2 k
N ðxÞ cl2 F ðxÞ
l¼1 k l2
|fflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflffl{zfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflffl}
only cracktip nodes
ð1Þ
where x ¼ fx; yg is the two-dimensional coordinate system, I is the
set of all nodes in the mesh, N i ðxÞ is the shape function associated
 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94
Fig. 1. Enriched nodes in the XFEM.
with node i, ui are the classical degrees of freedom for node i. J  I
is the set of nodes whose shape function support is cut by a crack, bj
is the vector of corresponding additional degrees of freedom for
modeling crack faces (not crack-tips). If the crack is aligned with
the mesh, bj represent the opening of the crack, H(x) is the Heav-
iside function. K 1  I and K 2  I are the set of nodes whose shape
function support contains the first and second crack tips in their
influence domain, respectively. cl1 l2
k and ck are the vector of corre-
sponding additional degrees of freedom which are related to the
modeling of crack-tips, as the near-tip regions are enriched with
four different crack functions. F l1 ðxÞ and F l2 ðxÞ are the asymptotic
crack-tip enrichment functions. If there is no enrichment, then the
above equation reduces to the classical finite element approxima-
P the need to model the stress singularity. Phantom nodes which are
tion ufem ðxÞ ¼ i ui N i ðxÞ.
The first term on the right-hand side of the above equation (Eq.
(1)) is applied to all the nodes while the second term is only valid
for nodes whose shape function support is cut by the crack interior,
and the third (fourth) term is used only for nodes whose shape
function support is cut by the crack tip.
2.2. Enrichment functions
To model the discontinuity in displacement field, the enrich-
ment function H(x) which we refer to as a generalized Heaviside
enrichment function is implemented in the simulation of pow-
der-die contact surface. The function H(x) takes the value of +1
above the crack, and 1 below the crack. The function H(x) is given
by
 ing to the respective part of the original element). The two sub-
1 if ðx  x Þ  n P 0
HðxÞ ¼ ð2Þ
1 otherwise
where x is a sample gauss point, x (lies on the crack) is the closest
point to x (Fig. 2), and n is the unit outward normal to the crack at
x . Fig. 2 illustrates the discontinuous jump function across the
crack surface.
In order to model the crack-tip and also to improve the repre-
sentation of crack-tip fields, crack-tip enrichment functions are
Fig. 2. Representation of normal and tangential coordinates for a smooth crack.
83
used in the element which contains the crack tip. For an isotropic
material, the crack-tip enrichment functions F l ðr; hÞ which are also
shown in Fig. 2 are given as
 
4 pffiffiffi h pffiffiffi h pffiffiffi h pffiffiffi h
fF l ðr; hÞgl¼1 ¼ r sin ; r cos ; r sin h sin ; r sin h cos
2 2 2 2
ð3Þ
where (r; h) is the local polar coordinate system with its origin at
the crack tip, and h = 0 is tangent to the crack at the tip. Note that
pffiffiffi
the first function in Eq. (3) r sin h=2, is discontinuous across the
crack plane whereas the last three functions are continuous. It bears
emphasis that the near-tip discontinuity can be represented with
other sets of functions, or even a single function which is discontin-
uous across the crack tip geometry. Multiple cracks can be treated
in the above framework, by incorporating additional discontinuous
and near-tip enrichment.
The cohesive segments method [25] in conjunction with phan-
tom nodes proposed by Song et al. [27] has been used in the
framework of the XFEM to simulate the crack initiation and prop-
agation along arbitrary, solution-dependent paths in the bulk
materials for brittle or ductile fracture. The cohesive segments
are not restricted to being located along element boundaries, but
can be located at arbitrary locations and in arbitrary directions,
allowing for the resolution of complex crack patterns. In this case
the near-tip asymptotic singularity is not needed, and only the dis-
placement jump across a cracked element, which is described
using the phantom node method, is considered. Therefore, the
crack has to propagate across an entire element at a time to avoid
superposed on the original real nodes, are utilized to represent the
discontinuity of the cracked elements, as illustrated in Fig. 3
[27,33]. Propagation of a crack along an arbitrary path is made
possible by the use of phantom nodes that initially have exactly
the same coordinates as the real nodes and that are completely
constrained to the real nodes up to damage initiation. In an
uncrack element, each phantom node is completely constrained
to their corresponding real nodes (n1 to n4 ). But when crossed by
a crack at Cc , the element is partitioned into two subdomains,
XA and XB . The discontinuity in the displacement is made possible
by adding phantom nodes (n01 to n04 ) superimposed to the original
nodes. The existing element is replaced by two sub-elements,
referred to as element A and element B. Each sub-element is
formed by a combination of some real nodes (the ones correspond-
ing to the cracked part) and phantom nodes (the ones correspond-
elements are constituted by the nodes n01 ; n02 ; n3 and n4 ðnA Þ and
n1 ; n2 ; n03 , and n04 ðnB Þ. Each phantom node and its corresponding
real node are no longer tied together and can move apart. Both ele-
ments are only partially active, the active part of element A is XA
and the active part of element B is XB . This is represented numer-
ically in the definition of the displacement field: the displacement
of a point with coordinates x is computed by
(
uA ðx; tÞ ¼ uAj ðtÞNj ðxÞ; x 2 XA
ð4Þ
uB ðx; tÞ ¼ uBj ðtÞNj ðxÞ; x 2 XB
The approximation of the displacement field is then given by:
X X
uðx; t Þ ¼ uAj ðtÞNj ðxÞHðf ðxÞÞ þ uBj ðtÞNj ðxÞHðf ðxÞÞ ð5Þ
j2nA |fflfflfflfflfflfflffl{zfflfflfflfflfflfflffl} j2nB |fflfflfflfflfflfflffl{zfflfflfflfflfflfflffl}
uA ðx;t Þ uB ðx;t Þ
where nA and nB are the index sets of the nodes of superposed ele-
ment A and element B, respectively; f ðxÞ is the signed distance mea-
sured from the crack.
The crack normal opening dn and the tangential sliding dt are
shown in the following equation:
84 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94

Fig. 3. Representation of cracked elements by implementation of phantom node method.


dn ¼ n½u In the analysis, the effects of the small amplitude free surface
ð6Þ
dt ¼ k½u  ndn k waves, which are commonly referred to as the sloshing effects,
are taken into account. The sloshing effects cause a pressure at
where [u] is the jump in the displacement given as the free surface of fluid, which is given by
X X
½u ¼ Nj uAj  Nj uBj ð7Þ P ¼ cw ufn ð9Þ
j2nA j2nB
where cw is the weight density of fluid and ufn is the normal com-
In order to control the magnitude of separation, the cohesive ponent of the free surface displacement. The free surface stiffness
law is defined. A separation occurs when the cohesive strength of for fluid is obtained from the discrete form of Eq. (9).
the cracked element is zero, after which the phantom and the real In this study, the equations of motion of the fluid system are
nodes move independently. This method which provides an effec- obtained using energy principles. Using the finite element approx-
tive and attractive engineering approach, has been used to simu- imation, the total strain energy of the fluid system can be written
late the initiation and growth of multiple cracks in solids by as
Remmers et al. [25] and Song et al. [27]. The detail of the flowchart
for crack propagation simulation can be found in references 1
pe ¼ UTf Kf Uf ð10Þ
[34,35]. 2
In the XFEM, the mesh is not required to conform to the geo- where Uf is the nodal displacement vector, Kf is the stiffness matrix
metric discontinuities. Two signed distance functions per node of the fluid system. Kf is obtained by the sum of the stiffness matri-
are generally required to describe the crack location, including ces of the fluid elements as follows
the location of crack tips, in a cracked geometry. The first signed P )
distance function describes the crack surface, while the second is Kf ¼ Kef
R ð11Þ
used to construct an orthogonal surface so that the intersection Kef ¼ V
BeT e
f Cf Bf dV
e

of the two surfaces gives the crack front. The first signed distance
function is assigned only to nodes of elements intersected by the where Cf is the elasticity matrix consisting of diagonal terms in Eq.
crack, while the second is assigned only to nodes of elements con- (8). Bef is the strain–displacement matrix of the fluid element.
taining the crack tips. An important behavior of fluid systems is the ability to displace
without a change in volume. For reservoir and storage tanks, this
3. Lagrangian formulation for dynamic interaction of dam– movement is known as sloshing waves in which the displacement
reservoir–foundation systems is in the vertical direction. The increase in the potential energy of
the system because of the free surface motion can be written as
The formulation of the fluid–solid system based on Lagrangian 1
approach is given according to Refs. [36,37]. In this approach, dis- ps ¼ UTsf Sf Usf ð12Þ
2
placements are selected as the variables in both fluid and structure
where Usf and Sf are the vertical nodal displacement vector and the
domains. Fluid is assumed to be linearly elastic, inviscid and irro-
stiffness matrix of the free surface of the fluid system, respectively.
tational. For a general two-dimensional fluid element, the stress–
Sf is obtained by the sum of the stiffness matrices of the free surface
strain relationships can be written as:
   fluid elements as follows
P C 11 0 ev P )
¼ ð8Þ Sf ¼ Sef
Pz 0 C 22 WZ R T ð13Þ
Sef ¼ qf g A hs hs dAe
where P is the pressure, C 11 is the bulk modulus of fluid and ev is the
volumetric strain; W z is the rotation about the axis z; Pz and C 22 are where hs is the vector consisting of interpolation functions of the
the rotational stress and constraint parameter related with W z , free surface fluid element. qf and g are the mass density of the fluid
respectively. Note that the rotation constraint parameter C 22 in and the acceleration due to gravity, respectively. In addition, the
the above stress–strain relationship of fluid is introduced to enforce kinetic energy of the system can be written as
the irrotationality of fluid by penalty method. It should be as high as
1 _T
necessary to prevent fluid rotation but small enough to avoid caus- T¼ U Mf U_ f ð14Þ
ing numerical ill-conditioning in the assembled stiffness matrix. 2 f
 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94 85

where U _ and Mf are the nodal velocity vector and the mass matrix where U n is the normal component of the interface displacement
of the fluid system, respectively. Mf is also obtained by the sum of [39]. Using the interface condition, the equations of motion of the
the mass matrices of the fluid elements as follows coupled system to ground motions including damping effects are
P ) given by
Mf ¼ Mef
R T ð15Þ € c þ Cc U
Mc U _ c þ Kc Uc ¼ Rc ð18Þ
Mf ¼ qf V H H dV e
e

where H is the matrix consisting of interpolation functions of the
fluid element. If Eqs. (10), (12) and (14) are combined using the
Lagrange’s equations [38], the following set of equations is obtained
€ f þ K Uf ¼ Rf
Mf U
f acceleration.
where U € f ; Uf ; K and Rf are the nodal acceleration, the nodal dis-
f
placement, the system stiffness matrix including the free surface
stiffness and the time-varying nodal force vector for the fluid sys-
tem, respectively. In the formation of the fluid element matrices,
reduced integration orders are utilized.
The equations of motion of the fluid system (Eq. (16)), have a
similar form to those of the structure system. For obtaining the
coupled equations of the fluid–structure system, it is required to
determine the interface condition. Because the fluid is assumed
to be inviscid, only the displacement in the normal direction to
the interface is continuous at the interface of the system. Assuming
that positive face is the structure and negative face is the fluid, the
boundary condition at the fluid–structure interface is
U n ¼ U þn
where Mc ; Cc and Kc are the mass, damping and stiffness matrices
_ c and U
for the coupled system, respectively. Uc ; U € c are the vectors
of the displacement, velocity, acceleration of the coupled system,
respectively. Rc is the time-varying nodal force vector of ground
ð16Þ
4. Validation test
The Koyna gravity dam, which is one of a few concrete dams
that have experienced structural damage during earthquakes, is
selected to validate the numerical framework we used. In this
paper, the XFEM implemented in ABAQUS finite element program
is used to predict the initiation and growth of cracks and subse-
quent nonlinear structural behavior. The time histories of the
Koyna earthquake are shown in Fig. 4. The finite element model
of the dam–reservoir–foundation interaction system is given in
Fig. 5(a), and the dimensions of the dam are given in Fig. 5(b). In
the initial time step, displacements of the nodal points on the left
and right truncated boundary of the reservoir and foundation are
ð17Þ
assumed to be zero in the normal direction. In addition, the bottom

0.4 Horizontal component 0.4 Vertical component

Acceleration (g)
Acceleration(g)

0.2 0.2

0.0 0.0

-0.2 -0.2

-0.4 -0.4

0 2 4 6 8 10 0 2 4 6 8 10
Time (s) Time (s)
(a) Horizontal component (b) Vertical component

Fig. 4. Koyna earthquake on December 11, 1967: (a) horizontal component and (b) vertical component.

(a) Dam-reservoir-foundation system (b) Concrete gravity dam

Fig. 5. Finite element discretization for the dam–reservoir–foundation system of Koyna dam. (a) Dam–reservoir–foundation system. (b) Concrete gravity dam.
86 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94
boundary of the foundation is fully constrained. After static analy-
sis, displacement constraints are released, and the horizontal and
vertical components of the Koyna earthquake accelerations are
applied to the base of the foundation as input load. The material
parameters for the Koyna dam concrete are as follows: the elastic-
ity modulus E = 3.1  104 MPa, the Poisson’s ratio m = 0.2, the mass
density q = 2643 kg/m3, the fracture energy is 250 N/m. The tensile
and compressive strength of the dam are 2.9 and 24.1 MPa, respec-
tively. The foundation rock is assumed to be linearly elastic. In
order to avoid reflection of the outgoing waves, the foundation
rock is assumed to be massless. The elasticity modulus and Pois-
son’s ratio of the foundation rock are taken as 21.6 GPa and 0.20,
respectively. The fluid is assumed to be linearly elastic, inviscid
and irrotational. The bulk modulus and mass density of the fluid
are taken as 2.07 GPa and 1000 kg/m3. The rotation constraint
parameter of the fluid is assumed to be 100 times of the bulk mod-
ulus. A dynamic magnification factor of 1.2 is considered for the
tensile strength to account for strain rate effects. The energy dissi-
pation of the dam and foundation is considered by the Rayleigh
damping method with 5% damping ratio. The maximum reservoir
water level of 96.5 m is considered. It should be noted that the seis-
mic water pressure effects inside the cracks are not considered in
the analysis. Further studies of the effect of seismic water pressure
on the crack propagation and dynamic response of the dam are
deemed necessary.
Dynamic crack propagation analysis of Koyna gravity dam
under the 1967 earthquake is conducted employing the XFEM
based cohesive segments method. Fig. 6 shows the final crack pro-
file of Koyna dam under the 1967 Koyna earthquake obtained from
the numerical simulation and the model test [40], respectively. It
can be noted that the occurring crack profile matches reasonably
well with the experimental result from the model test. By compar-
ing the current results with the Koyna dam prototype observation
[41], model test [40] and previous research results [11,15,16,23], it
may be concluded that the XFEM procedure can predict effectively
the crack propagation process in concrete gravity dams under seis-
mic conditions.
(a) Numerical result
from the XFEM procedure
Fig. 6. The final failure modes of Koyna dam under the 1967 earthquake. (a) Numerical result from the XFEM procedure. (b) Experimental result from the model test [40].
5. Seismic potential failure mode analysis of Guandi concrete
gravity dam–reservoir–foundation system
5.1. FEM model and material properties
In this section, the seismic potential failure modes of the Guandi
concrete gravity dam–reservoir–foundation system are studied.
The Guandi gravity dam with a design PGA of 0.34 g is located on
the Yalong River in the Sichuan Province of China. A typical non-
overflow monolith with a height of 142 m is employed to model
its seismic damage process. The dam–reservoir–foundation inter-
action system is shown in Fig. 7. Lagrangian approach is used for
the finite element modeling of dam–reservoir–foundation interac-
tion problem. For the initial time step, displacements of nodes on
the left and right truncated boundary of the dam–reservoir–foun-
dation system are assumed to be zero in the normal direction. In
addition, the base of the foundation is fully constrained. For the
sequent dynamic analysis, all displacement constraints are
released, and the horizontal and vertical components of the
selected earthquake accelerations are applied to the foundation
base as input load. The material parameters of the fluid are
assumed as aforementioned. The traditional massless foundation
approach is utilized herein to account for the dam–foundation
interaction. Since the presented research aims at the seismic dam-
age process of concrete gravity dams, nonlinearity of the founda-
tion rock is not considered. The energy dissipation of the
monolith is considered by the Rayleigh damping method with 5%
damping ratio. Three indices of concrete are employed, i.e., C15,
C20 and C25. The static material properties are listed in Table 1.
The tensile strength is taken as 10% of its compressive counterpart.
The elasticity modulus and Poisson’s ratio of the foundation rock
are taken as 21.6 GPa and 0.20, respectively. To account for the
effects of strain rate, modulus and strength for the dam and mod-
ulus for the foundation rock are increased by 30% according to the
Code for Seismic Design of Hydraulic Structures in China. Both hor-
izontal direction and vertical direction are subjected to earthquake
excitation.
(b) Experimental result from
the model test [40]
 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94 87

(a) Dam-reservoir-foundation system (b) Guandi gravity dam

Fig. 7. Finite element meshes of the Guandi graivty dam–reservoir–foundation system. (a) Dam–reservoir–foundation system. (b) Guandi gravity dam.

Table 1
Material properties of the Guandi gravity dam.

Concrete Modulus (GPa) Poisson’s ratio Density (kg/m3) Compressive strength (MPa) Tensile strength (MPa) Fracture energy (N/m)
C15 56.0 0.167 2552 14.53 1.45 205
C20 57.6 0.167 2552 19.38 1.94 257
C25 58.8 0.167 2552 21.45 2.15 300

5.2. Seismic response and crack propagation analysis of the Guandi
dam under design peak ground acceleration
In this section, the effects of the concrete cracking damage on
the seismic response of the dam–reservoir–foundation system
under design peak ground acceleration (PGA) of 0.34 g are investi-
gated by comparison of the linear and nonlinear dynamic solutions
of the system. The linear solution is obtained by assuming the con-
crete to be linear elastic while the nonlinear dynamic solution of
the dam is obtained from the XFEM-based cohesive segments
method. Namely, the concrete cracking damage resulting from
the seismic ground motion is considered in the nonlinear solution.
Besides the effects of the concrete cracking damage, we also ana-
lyze and discuss the full process of dynamic cracking of the Guandi
dam. The Koyna earthquake as shown in Fig. 4, which is scaled to
have 0.34 g spectral acceleration in the stream direction, is used
as seismic excitation. The implicit Newmark-b method is used in
the incremental dynamic analysis for time stepping, which is
unconditionally stable. That is to say, any time step will lead to
stable results. However, in order to ensure accurate time integra-
tion, sufficiently small time increment are needed. On the other
hand, excessive time steps result in high burden and poor compu-
tational efficiency. In practice, an adequate balance between accu-
racy and efficiency can be obtained by choosing the following
combination: the initial increment size and maximum increment
size are 0.001 s and 0.01 s, respectively. Meanwhile, automatic
time incrementation is used for the dynamic analysis to further
improve the efficiency.
Fig. 8 compares the history of horizontal and vertical displace-
ments at the dam crest obtained from the linear elastic method

1.0
2.00cm Linear
2 1.91cm
Non-linear
0.92cm Linear
0.5 Non-linear
Displacement (cm)

Displacement (cm)

0.28cm
1
0.0
0
-0.5
-0.19cm
-1 -1.0
-0.99cm
-2 -1.97cm -1.5
-1.60cm

0 2 4 6 8 10 0 2 4 6 8 10
Time (s) Time (s)
(a) Horizontal displacement (b) Vertical displacement

Fig. 8. Time history graphs of the horizontal and vertical displacements of the point P1 at the dam crest. (a) Horizontal displacement. (b) Vertical displacement.
88 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94

and the XFEM, respectively, when the Guandi dam is under the
combined static and earthquake loads. The solid lines are the
response of the dam using the XFEM, whereas the dashed lines
are the dam response assuming the concrete is linear elastic. The
positive directions of the horizontal and vertical displacement
are in the downstream and upward directions, respectively. As
can be seen in Fig. 8, the nonlinear dynamic response before crack-
ing initiation (1.90 s) are coincident with the response calculated
from the linear elastic analysis. This means that the maximum
principal stress in the dam does not exceed the tensile strength
of the concrete during the relatively small amplitude motion, and
there is no cracking before t = 1.90 s. The subsequent displace-
ments obtained from the linear and nonlinear solutions separate
with each other as the cracks form and propagate in the dam. It
2.0
1.79cm
1.5
COD (cm)
is clear from Fig. 8 that the nonlinear response has a substantially
different displacement history than the linear model after
t = 3.67 s. The vibration periods of displacement response are also
changed by the crack propagation, and a lengthened vibration per-
iod from the XFEM procedure is found. It implies that the crest dis-
placements are dominated by rigid–body rocking of the upper
portion of the dam after the formation of cracks near the change
in the slope of the downstream face. At all times the nonlinear
response analysis shows that the dam remains stable.
Figs. 9 and 10 present the time history graphs of the crack open-
ing displacements, and the histories of the sliding of the upper
block of the dam after the formation of the penetrated crack. As
shown in Fig. 9, the peak of crack opening displacement at the
downstream end happens at 4.32 s, reaching 1.79 cm, and at the
upstream end happens at 3.92 s, reaching 0.77 cm. It can also be
found form Fig. 9 that the crack opening displacement at the
downstream end is dominant compared with that at the upstream
Downstream
Upstream end. The reason for this is mainly because the upstream-sloped
crack, which increases the resistance against downstream sliding
of the upper block, makes the upper block easier to rotate toward

1.0 0.77cm
the upstream direction rather than downstream direction under
0.5 seismic conditions. As may be seen from Fig. 10, the maximum
sliding displacement toward the downstream direction is 0.26 cm
0.0 at 3.69 s, and toward the upstream direction is 2.08 cm at
Initial crack Penetrated crack 3.92 s. It may be concluded that when the Koyna earthquake scaled
-0.5 to have 0.34 g spectral acceleration in the stream direction causes
0 2 4 6 8 10
the penetrated crack damage to the dam, the upper block remains
Time (s) stable against overturning, as the maximum sliding displacement
of 2.08 cm is almost negligible, and the residual displacement is
Fig. 9. Time history graphs of the crack opening displacement (COD).
very small.
Crack propagation processes in the Guandi gravity dam at four
selected times as predicted using the XFEM procedure are shown
0.5
0.26cm in Fig. 11. As shown, the smooth curvature discrete crack penetrat-
Sliding along the crack (cm)

0.0 ing the elements is obtained. Damage initiates from regions with
very high stress concentrations. An upstream-sloped in the dam
-0.5 is initiated at the discontinuity in the slope of the downstream face
Penetrated crack
at about t = 1.90 s (Fig. 11(a)). At this location, stresses are concen-
-1.0 trated and the tensile stresses take large values. As the vibration
characteristics, the crack extends deeper inside of the dam. The ini-
-1.5
tial crack propagates almost perpendicular to the downstream sur-
-2.0 face. The crack trajectory curves down due to the compressive
-2.08cm stresses resulting from rocking of the top block (Fig. 11(a) and
-2.5 (b)). At t = 2.59 s, the upper crack propagates to about three-fifth
0 2 4 6 8 10 through the thickness of the dam section (Fig. 11(b)). After the
Time (s) time instant t = 2.59 s, the crack propagates approximately hori-
zontally toward the upstream face. At t = 3.67 s, the downstream
Fig. 10. Sliding displacement histories of the upper block of the dam after the
formation of penetrated crack.
crack extends completely to the upstream face at a height of

(a)Time A (t=1.90s) (b) Time B (t=2.59s) (c) Time C (t=3.67s) (d) Time D (t=3.98s)

Fig. 11. Processes of the crack propagation in the Guandi gravity dam at four selected times. (a) Time A (t = 3.87 s). (b) Time B (t = 4.00 s). (c) Time C (t = 4.27 s). (d) Time D
(t = 4.48 s). (Amplification factor: 100.)
 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94 89

118.4 m above the base, penetrating the whole section of the dam
(Fig. 11(c)). Because of the thrust of impounded water which is
opposing the tendency of the top section to slide along the crack
in the upstream direction, the computed crack profiles in the upper
part of the dam can be considered neutral or favorable conditions
to maintain stability.
5.3. Potential failure mode analysis of concrete gravity dams
In order to investigate the potential failure modes of concrete
gravity dam–reservoir–foundation systems subjected to strong
ground motions, 40 real earthquake records, which have been
selected from the databases of the COSMOS [42] and PEER [43]
with a broad distribution of durations, are applied to the structure.
The seismic sequences with different earthquake magnitudes (i.e.,
M w 6.0–7.8) that have occurred in the United States, Taiwan and
India, are shown in Table 2. The data sample includes well-known
earthquakes with strong seismic activity, such as Loma Prieta
(1989), Northridge (1994), and Chi-Chi (1999) events. Owing to
the uncertainty of earthquake activities, the amplitude of earth-
quakes may vary over a wide range according to the seismic hazard
analysis with a different occurrence probability. Eight levels of
acceleration amplitudes are employed in the analysis, i.e., 0.2 g,
0.3 g, 0.34 g, 0.4 g, 0.50 g, 0.6 g, 0.7 g and 0.8 g. By increasing the
earthquake intensity, the structure is shifted from its initial elastic
state into a series of successive inelastic states and finally to its col-
lapse. In each seismic analysis first the static loads including the
self-weight of the dam and the hydrostatic load on upstream face
of the dam are applied, and then the two components of the
selected earthquakes are uniformly applied at the base of the
foundation.
Failure mode analysis of concrete gravity dams–reservoir–foun-
dation systems is carried out through nonlinear IDA based on
XFEM. The final cracking profiles of the Guandi gravity dam under
the 1967 Koyna record at different shaking intensity levels are
shown in Fig. 12. The crack initiation occurs at different times
and locations depending on the amplitude. When the dam is
loaded with only static loads, stress level in the dam is relatively
low, no visible crack is detected. For the seismic motions associ-
ated with a PGA of 0.2 g, very minor damage is identified near
the change in downstream slope. With the increasing acceleration
excitation, the downstream surface and upstream surface as well
as the dam heel of the dam are characterized by high tensile stress
and compressive stress. At the 0.30 g level, some moderate damage
is identified but it does not seem to reach a level that could com-
promise the integrity of the section. The upper crack propagates
to about three-fifth through the thickness of the dam section.
The results corresponding to the 0.34–0.80 g PGA level clearly indi-
cate that significant damage is detected. At the 0.34 g level, the
upper crack propagates completely to the upstream face, causing
the dam head detached from the dam body. At the 0.6 g level,
cracks appear not only at the dam heel and the change in down-
stream slope, but also near the change in the slope of the upstream
face. As the dam oscillates during an earthquake, these cracks

Table 2
The earthquakes used in the failure mode analysis.

No. Earthquake Date Distance to fault (km) Station location Mw Comp. PGA (cm/s2)
1 Koyna 11-12-1967 13.0 Koyna Dam 6.5 0 464.78
2 Northridge 17-01-1994 12.5 Coldwater Canyon School #5309 6.7 180 313.30
3 Northridge 17-01-1994 35.8 Los Angeles Terrace #24592 6.7 180 310.10
4 Northridge 17-01-1994 15.7 Epiphany Litheran Church #5353 6.7 196 404.20
5 Northridge 17-01-1994 18.4 Los Angeles Mulholland Dr. #5314 6.7 35 641.90
6 Northridge 17-01-1994 8.6 Los Angeles Dam #2141 6.7 334 419.10
7 Northridge 17-01-1994 12.9 CA – White Oak Covenant Church #5303 6.7 180 467.90
8 Northridge 17-01-1994 7.1 Newhall, CA – Los Angeles County Fire #24279 6.7 360 578.20
9 Northridge 17-01-1994 8.6 Sylmar, CA – Jensen Filtration Plant #655 6.7 22 560.30
10 Northridge 17-01-1994 29.4 Warm Springs #24272 6.7 90 221.20
11 Northridge 17-01-1994 17.9 Tarzana, CA – Cedar Hill #24436 5.3 90 365.30
12 Chi-Chi 20-09-1999 8.3 Taichung, Taiwan #TCU078 7.6 0 301.80
13 Chi-Chi 20-09-1999 7.9 Taichung, Taiwan #TCU072 7.6 360 360.10
14 Chi-Chi 20-09-1999 8.9 Taichung, Taiwan #TCU050 7.6 0 127.50
15 Chi-Chi 20-09-1999 32.0 Ilan, Taiwan #ILA067 7.6 90 195.70
16 Chi-Chi 20-09-1999 37.2 Chiayi, Taiwan #CHY014 7.6 0 254.90
17 Chi-Chi 20-09-1999 3.2 Taichung, Taiwan #TCU076 7.6 90 336.10
18 Chi-Chi 20-09-1999 31.1 Chiayi, Taiwan #CHY086 7.6 0 201.60
19 Loma Prieta 18-10-1989 17.2 South St and Pine Dr. #47524 7.0 90 174.50
20 Loma Prieta 18-10-1989 15.9 Capitola, CA #47125 7.0 90 390.80
21 Loma Prieta 18-10-1989 11.9 Santa Teresa Hills #57563 7.0 315 223.40
22 Loma Prieta 18-10-1989 6.3 Gilroy Array Sta 3 # 47381 7.0 90 362.00
23 Loma Prieta 18-10-1989 22.7 Gilroy Array Sta 7 #57425 7.0 90 314.30
24 Loma Prieta 18-10-1989 2.8 Corralitos, CA #57007 7.0 90 469.40
25 Loma Prieta 18-10-1989 16.9 Coyote Lake Dam, CA #57217 7.0 285 471.00
26 Loma Prieta 18-10-1989 2.8 Gilroy Array Sta 1, CA #47379 7.0 90 433.60
27 Imperial Valley 15-10-1979 12.9 El Centro, CA – Array Sta 7 #5028 6.5 52 205.76
28 Imperial Valley 15-10-1979 5.6 El Centro, CA – Differential Array #5165 6.5 360 473.64
29 Imperial Valley 15-10-1979 9.8 Casa Flores Mexicali #6619 6.5 0 238.10
30 Imperial Valley 15-10-1979 5.2 El Centro, CA – Array Sta 5 #0952 6.5 230 360.37
31 Imperial Valley 15-10-1979 21.7 El Centro, CA – Array Sta 13 #5059 6.5 230 131.07
32 Imperial Valley 15-10-1979 8.8 Holtville, CA – Post Office #5055 6.5 225 242.96
33 Imperial Valley 15-10-1979 21.8 Superstition Mtn, CA – Camera Site #0286 6.5 135 182.19
34 Petrolia 17-08-1991 11.7 General Store #89156 6.0 90 488.70
35 Parkfield 28-09-2004 14.0 USGS Parkfield Dense #02 6.0 360 170.00
36 Superstition Hills 24-11-1987 13.0 Westmorland, CA #11369 6.6 180 203.56
37 Kern County 21-07-1952 36.2 Lincoln School #1095 7.5 111 175.95
38 San Simeon 22-12-2003 14.8 Caltrans Bridge Grnds #37737 6.5 90 175.00
39 Landers 28-06-1992 28.6 Whitewater Canyon #5072 7.3 270 124.92
40 Landers 28-06-1992 10.0 Joshua Tree #22170 7.3 90 278.40
90 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94

extend into the dam. The case associated with a PGA of 0.70 g A typical damage process of the Guandi gravity dam–reservoir–
shows clear indications of significant strength degradation in the foundation system subjected to the Koyna acceleration time histo-
dam, with two cracking patterns that completely extends across ries with an amplitude of 0.7 g, about 2.0 times the design PGA, is
the upper and middle sections. plotted in Fig. 13. As shown, three damage zones (i.e., the change in

(a) PGA=0.2g (b) PGA=0.3g (c) PGA=0.34g (d) PGA=0.4g

(e) PGA=0.5g (f) PGA=0.6g (g) PGA=0.7g (h) PGA=0.8g

Fig. 12. Final cracking profiles of the Guandi gravity dam subjected to Koyna record at various intensity levels.

(a) 1.84s (b) 1.89s (c) 1.95s (d) 2.23s

(e) 2.32s (f) 2.77s (g) 3.69s (h) 4.42s

Fig. 13. A typical damage process of the Guandi gravity dam under Koyna acceleration time histories with an amplitude of 0.7 g. (Amplification factor: 100).
 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94 91

the slope of the down face, the change in upstream slope and the
dam heel) are clearly identified and they correspond to the areas
associated with the maximum tensile demands. At 1.84 s, the ini-
tial crack in the dam is firstly observed near the change in the slope
of the down face (Fig. 13(a)). With the on-going acceleration exci-
tation, the crack extends deeper inside of the dam. During the next
seconds, this crack propagates quickly and finally to the upstream
face at 1.95 s, penetrating the whole section of the dam (Fig. 13(c)).
In addition, a crack develops in the dam heel at 2.23 s, which is
probably due to stress concentration (Fig. 13(d)). After the time
instant t = 2.32 s, a crack in the middle of the dam is initiated at
the change in the slope of the upstream face (Fig. 13(e)) and the

Fig. 14. Typical cracking profiles for the Guandi gravity dam under real earthquake records at different shaking intensity levels. (Amplification factor: 100.)
92 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94
tensile stress is remarkably concentrated here. With the continu-
ous vibration of the dam, this crack continues to grow downward
toward downstream in a slightly inclined direction (about 10° to
the horizontal). The crack propagates up to 27 m and then grows
upward toward downstream at an angle of about 50° with respect
to the dam bottom (Fig. 13(f) and (g)). At t = 4.42 s, the upstream
crack extends completely to the downstream face, penetrating
the whole section of the dam (Fig. 13(h)). This finally separates a
major portion of the structure and causes catastrophic failure.
In order to obtain the potential failure modes of concrete grav-
ity dams, 40 real earthquake records are selected as earthquake
excitation. Each record is scaled to 8 increasing intensity levels in
the stream direction to generate eight groups of acceleration exci-
tations. More than 320 cases were calculated in the present study.
But only some typical results are shown in this section. Typical
cracking profiles of the Guandi gravity dam for each record at a cer-
tain shaking intensity level are shown in Fig. 14. The deformations
of the dam at the end of the earthquakes can also be observed in
Fig. 14. It should be noted that the deformation has been magnified
100 times. These figures depict the damage predicted for different
real ground motions considered in this study. From the numerical
results, it can be found that the selected real strong motion records
have significant influence on the crack propagation process and the
finial cracking profile of concrete gravity dams, which may be
mainly because they have a different intensity parameter, such
as the peak ground acceleration (PGA), the strong motion duration
(SMD) and the spectral amplitudes for different characteristic peri-
ods. In addition to the previously mentioned three damage zones
(the dam neck, dam heel and change in upstream slope), other
Fig. 14 (continued)
two damage zones (the downstream face and concrete partition
junction) are also detected. The top cracking profiles are almost
either nearly horizontal or sloping downward from the down-
stream face toward the upstream face. It can also be found from
Fig. 14 that for concrete gravity dams, the dam neck is vulnerable
to damage due to stress concentration. At this location, penetrated
cracks are detected even under some smaller ground motions. In
some records, there are uncompleted cracks at the neck of the
dam. But in some earthquake analyses, there is no cracking at
the neck of the dam. With the increasing acceleration excitation,
cracks are predicted to initialize near the middle of the upstream
face or the downstream face, and multiple failure modes occur in
the dam, which may be because that the downstream and
upstream surfaces as well as the dam heel of the dam are charac-
terized by high tensile stress under strong ground motions.
From the 320 numerical simulations, five typical failure modes
are obtained, as shown in Fig. 15. The first failure mode (Fig. 15(a))
is cracking that initiates at the change in downstream slope and
propagates almost perpendicular to the downstream surface for a
certain distance. Then the cracking propagates approximately hor-
izontally toward the upstream face and separates the crest from
the upper part of the dam. The second failure mode (Fig. 15(b))
is cracking that initiates at the dam heel and progresses a certain
distance from the upstream face to the downstream face. In the
third failure mode (Fig. 15(c)), cracking in the middle of the dam
are initiated at the changes in the slope of the upstream face and
propagate toward downstream in a slightly inclined direction.
Finally the cracking reaches the downstream face. These crack
finally separates a major portion of the structure and causes catas-
 G. Wang et al. / Engineering Structures 98 (2015) 81–94
Failure mode I
Failure mode II
Failure mode II
(a) Failure mode I (b) Failure mode II
Fig. 15. Typical failure modes of concrete gravity dams under strong ground motions.
trophic failure. The fourth failure mode (Fig. 15(d)) is cracking that
initiates from the downstream face and travels almost normal to
the initiation surface. Then the cracking propagates across another
crack initiated from the change in upstream slope and finally pen-
etrates the whole section of the dam. In the fifth failure mode
(Fig. 15(e)), crack begins to initialize near the upper of the
upstream face, which is especially easy for the concrete partition
junction. Then it propagates approximately horizontally toward
the opposite face and finally reaches the downstream face, with
a cracking pattern that extends completely across the upper
section.
The first two failure modes can be caused by relatively minor
earthquakes. Since water pounding function of the reservoir is
retained to a great extent, no disastrous results would occur toward
the downstream areas. These latter three failure modes require
much stronger seismic excitations (maybe 1.5 times the design
PGA or even greater than that), as compared to the former two fail-
ure modes. Although earthquake shocks much stronger than the
design value are of low probability, the experiences from Hsin-
fengkiang gravity dam in China, Koyna gravity dam in India, and
Sefid Rud dam in Iran show that these could happen. The possible
failure in these three modes of dams retaining large quantities of
water will cause the most undesirable impact on the downstream
populated area along with a considerable amount of devastation.
This enlightens the importance for the dam designers and related
researchers to obtain insights into fracture mechanisms of the
dam under various dynamic load cases. Understanding the failure
pattern can also be used to assist in improving dam design and pro-
vide more realistic failure scenarios for subsequent dam break flood
modeling.
6. Conclusions
Dam failure will lead to catastrophic consequences including
loss of human life and property damage. The objective of this study
is to predict the possible failure modes of concrete gravity dams
with considering the effects of dam–reservoir–foundation interac-
tion. The reservoir water is modeled using two-dimensional fluid
finite elements by the Lagrangian approach. The extended finite
element method (XFEM) based on the cohesive segments method
in conjunction with the phantom node technique is presented to
deal with the numerical prediction of crack propagation in con-
crete gravity dams. The failure mode of Koyna dam predicted by
XFEM agrees well with the Koyna dam prototype observation,
model test and those of available methods in the literature indicate
that the XFEM procedure can effectively predict the crack propaga-
tion process and cracking profile in concrete gravity dams under
seismic conditions.
40 as-recorded strong ground motion records considered in this
study are used as seismic excitations. The crack propagation pro-
cess and potential failure modes of the Guandi gravity dam with
93
Failure mode v
Failure mode iv
Failure mode III
(c) Failure mode III (d) Failure mode iv (e) Failure mode v
considering the effects of dam–reservoir–foundation interaction
are investigated by applying the IDA method based on the XFEM.
Damage and cracking of concrete gravity dams in earthquakes
are caused mainly by excessive stress. The selected real strong
motion records have significant influence on the crack propagation
process and the finial cracking profile of concrete gravity dams. The
dam neck is vulnerable to damage, in which penetrated cracks are
detected even under some smaller ground motions. With the
increasing acceleration excitations, multiple failure modes occur
in the dam. Cracks at the dam neck, dam heel and abrupt change
in slope of upstream face are most often observed. Based on the
320 numerical simulation results, five typical failure modes are
obtained. Cracks may mainly occur in the following regions: the
discontinuity in the slope of the downstream face, the change in
upstream slope, the dam heel, the downstream face and the con-
crete partition junction. The obtained potential failure modes of
the dam can be used to assist in improving dam design and provide
more realistic failure scenarios for subsequent dam break flood
modeling.
Acknowledgments
The authors gratefully appreciate the supports from the Chinese
National Programs for Fundamental Research and Development
(973Program) (No. 2011CB013501), the Chinese National Science
Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars (No. 51125037), and the
Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities
(2042015kf0001).
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