Authors: Blake Stephens, Katie Davis, Beto Patino-Luna, Miles McIntosh, Jenna Lambert, Dean Wink, Corban Larson

Mentors: Juk Bhattacharyya, Ozgur Yavuzcetin

Loss of life, destruction of infrastructure, and damage to land are a few of the effects landslides can have on society. Landslides, due to bluff erosion, are becoming increasingly common along Lake Michigan due to high wave action and increased rainfall due to climate change. The goal is to understand the precursors to a landslide and how we can monitor and predict landslides. The benefits of this research include: providing landslide knowledge to the public and protecting citizens who live near shorelines.

Our research involves conducting lab control experiments on sand slopes. In these experiments, we used a plastic container to hold unsorted sand, with a 45 to 55 degree sloped surface. A sandbag (0.05kg) at the end of a string gauge with two capacitors the push and pull stress would communicate this information to the Raspberry Pi computer collecting the data. Our experiments consisted of 10 second intervals of pouring 60cc of deionized water. Then, letting the sand settle for one minute intervals.

The data shows a similar trend for each test. In the first half, the gauge gives us negative (push) greetings before rapidly rising to positive (pull) greetings. Then it levels off until a positive jump in value occurs as the sand gives way to a landslide. Even though the duration was different for each test, we could predict when the landslide would occur based on where we were in the graph.

Our project ultimately will lead to designing systems that can take measurements of large land masses in the field and send the data remotely to a collection site. This will allow continuous monitoring of land forms to help protect citizens from landslides.