WATER-ICE ACTIONS ON THE COAL QUAY AT KAPP AMSTERDAM IN SVALBARD

摘要

Ice and water actions on structural elements of a quay in Arctic conditions are studied in natural conditions and in laboratory experiments. Significant deformations of the steel sheet piling supporting the coal quay in Kapp Amsterdam in Svalbard were discovered. Physical mechanism of the ice action on the skirts are related to the brine migration through the ice in upward direction under the influence of vertical pressure gradient induced by tide and the brine freezing when it moves from the ice bottom at the freezing point to the ice surface having lower temperature. Laboratory experiments modelling this effect are performed in a small ice tank in the cold laboratory at UNIS. Permeability of saline ice by the brine and the formation of the lateral ice stresses induced by the migration of the brine through the ice are studied in the experiments.