Analysis on the damage causes of sabo dam with one open cross section at upstream of Fuxing bridge in Lacus Creek

Abstract

Lacus Creek is one of the important tributaries of the Laonong River upstream of the Gaoping River, which is an important river in southern Taiwan. After Typhoon Morakot in 2009, severe sediment disasters occurred, which affected the security of local revitalization, and the government has since invested in numerous projects to reduce the impact of sediment and flood disasters. In 2017, the Kaohsiung City government built a sabo type dam upstream of Fuxing Bridge in Lacus Creek; however, it was severely damaged by a heavy rain less than a year later. To investigate the cause of the damage, site investigations, concrete sampling tests, hydrology analysis, and reviews of the planning and design methods, construction process, etc. have been conducted, in order to understand the cause of the problem, avoid repeating mistakes, and clarify the responsibility of the administrative agency. The investigation and research found that many recent cases of torrent management have considered the transverse structures as isolated wildlife corridors, reduce the height of the transverse structures, create gentle slopes of the downstream surfaces, add fish passages, cut (openings) export slits, etc.; however, after setting up these environmentally friendly facilities, their effect and impact have not been explored in depth. This research survey found that, although the frequency of heavy rain events is not high in recent years, the current iterative impact of continuous rainfall may exceed the original design requirements. If the overflow mode with a single export opening is added, the scouring energy will be concentrated, and this additive effect is likely to cause the foundation of the sabo dam to lose bare space, and finally, the dam will be damaged. Therefore, it is recommended that when designing these torrent transverse structures, try to avoid using the method of a single narrow opening: it is better to increase the number of export openings (like a slit dam), expand the size of a single export opening, or adopt a fully enclosed dam design.