Characterization of the geological and geotechnical conditions at the village of Monsanto

The stability of slopes and hillsides involving rock or soil masses depends crucially on the occurring geological and geotechnical conditions. The village of Monsanto, municipality of Idanha-a-Nova, is located on a granitic inselberg. The tourist interest of the village lies largely in the fusion of the granitic rock mass with the man-made constructions and in the aesthetics of several granitic boulders scattered throughout the village. In the present work the geological and geotechnical characterization of the rock mass has been carried out, namely by the field survey of the entire intervention area and by a set of laboratory tests on samples collected in the field (ultrasound propagation velocity and the uniaxial compression test). Based on this information, the shear strength of the discontinuities was estimated and a kinematic analysis was performed using the Dips 7.0 commercial software, with the objective of defining the predominant sets of joints and identifying the most probable failure mechanisms in each hillside.