Ground penetrating radar applied to subsurface culverts

Tess Luo, Song Zhu, Yiliminuer Yikeremu, Jiasong Zhu*, John van Genderen

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

2 Citations (Scopus)
31 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

The failures of culverts can result in water and soil loss in the surrounding subsurface, leading to collapses. In densely constructed urban areas, buried culverts are inaccessible and invisible, making Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) inspection a widely adopted nondestructive and efficient method. Previous research has employed artificial intelligence to automate GPR interpretation by identifying special radargram textures, but the irregular GPR responses of degraded subsurface soils present a challenge. Therefore, this study proposes a method for preliminary diagnosing large-scale culverts based on GPR wave attributes. The method comprises three parts: (1) evaluating soil compactness by estimating the tortuosity of GPR responses at the culvert top; (2) investigating soil moisture using the attenuation rate of GPR responses; and (3) overlaying the results of the incompact and moist soils to pinpoint potential degradations. Two long-distance culverts were inspected and diagnosed using the proposed method, and three abnormal sections were identified and confirmed by excavation evaluation. The case studies indicate that the proposed method can quickly provide reference for further in-depth investigation, thereby improving GPR survey efficiency and reducing workload by narrowing the investigation scope. Consequently, this study can facilitate large-scale GPR culvert surveys and further safeguard the water system.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1-17
JournalGeo-spatial information science
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print/First online - 2 Aug 2023

Keywords

  • Culvert diagnosis
  • Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR)
  • Soil degradation
  • Wave attribute
  • ITC-GOLD
  • ITC-ISI-JOURNAL-ARTICLE

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