Failure Process of Stone Columns in Collapsible Soils

Many countries in the word have loose and unstable soils encompassing a wide range ofgeological materials, which when inundated, may collapse and cause very significant distress to thestructure. stone columns have been used to strengthen such soils; even so, there are still cases wherefailure has occurred. in this technical note, the process and causes of stone column failure inreinforcing collapsible soils is examined. a behavior analysis of a typical element of soil in thevicinity of column during inundation was studied. the difference between the behavior of a stonecolumn in a collapsible fill and a column in a non-collapsible fill is reported in this paper. also asolution for the problem of stone column failure is suggested.