Liquefaction at the Imperial Valley Wildlife Site
Abstract
In November 1987, two earthquakes occurred near a site in the Imperial Valley, California, where extensive field instrumentation had been placed by the US Geological Survey. The site was part of a wildlife refuge and has come to be called the Wildlife Site, or simply Wildlife. Some controversy arose subsequent to the earthquakes because of concern the field piezometers at the site may not have responded accurately in the second, larger earthquake. In this paper we re-examine the data from both earthquakes in an effort to (i) better understand the response of Wildlife during shaking, (ii) shed some light on the validity of the measured pore pressures from the larger earthquake, and (iii) investigate an alternative hypothesis for how liquefaction may develop.