Retaining Wall Failure

Donan Engineering has investigated a large number of retaining wall failures. A retaining wall needs to hold all the material that fills the space between itself and the failure plane. Many of our studies have been related to losses for original design and construction errors, product failures, storm and flood damages, vehicle impact damages, mine subsidence, earthquakes, and blasting vibrations.

Landscape timbers and railroad ties lack the weight to hold back the soil and need the help of “deadmen,” or anchor supports, buried in the soil. Substandard design and rotten wood resulting from long-term, inadequate surface drainage has caused this wall to collapse.