A practical approach for reliability analysis of unsaturated slope by conditional random finite element method

The paper presents a method for reliability analysis of slopes in unsaturated soils. Conditional random fields are simulated by consideration possible fluctuations of the measured soil properties. To predict the unsaturated soil behaviour, suctions are estimated and implemented in a finite element analysis. Numerical results of a case study demonstrate that the use of conditional random fields, affects not only the standard deviation of the safety factor distribution, but can also cause considerable variation in the mean value. It is concluded that unsaturated conditions can result in higher slope reliability, but with potentially more extensive failure zones.