Reported tailings dam failures

Floods from tailings dam failures.

This paper compiles the available information on historic tailings dam failures with the purpose to establish simple correlations between tailings ponds geometric parameters (e.g., dam height, tailings volume) and the hydraulic characteristics of floods resulting from released tailings. Following the collapse of a mining waste dam, only a part of tailings and polluted water stored at the dam is...

Reported tailings dam failures. A review of the European incidents in the worldwide context.

A detailed search and re-evaluation of the known historical cases of tailings dam failure was carried out. A corpus of 147 cases of worldwide tailings dam disasters, from which 26 located in Europe, was compiled in a database. This contains six sections, including dam location, its physical and constructive characteristics, actual and putative failure cause, sludge hydrodynamics, socio-economic...

Diversion of Water from a Tailings Dam

Geo-Seismic Environmental Aspects Affecting Tailings Dams Failures

Seismic performance evaluations of tailings dams are essential for characterizing the geoenvironmental risks posed by these earthen structures, which should include the geotechnical hazards implied by slope instability failure, free board loss and the potential release of contaminants. The observed damage is more important when liquefaction occurs on the dam body and foundation, which often lea...

Analysis of earth dam failures - A database approach

A dam may fail when the loading (overtopping flood, flow through or beneath the dam, earthquake or blasting loading, terrorist attacks, deterioration etc.) exceeds the resistance against overtopping, internal erosion, slope instability, sliding/overturning, excessive deformation etc. To properly describe the causes of dam failures, it is necessary to study characteristics of the dams which have...