An analytical study of the hazards of geological problems in engineering geological investigation
Publié en ligne: 24 mars 2025
Reçu: 24 oct. 2024
Accepté: 11 févr. 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/amns-2025-0751
Mots clés
© 2025 Er Wu et al., published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Engineering geological investigation work is one of the important factors to ensure that the project can be safely constructed [1]. This is because the accuracy of engineering geological investigation determines the quality of engineering construction, in the process of engineering construction, if the engineering area within the scope of the hydrogeological problems are not properly dealt with, so that the construction of the project there is a great safety hazard [2-4].
The most important cause of hydrological problems in geological investigation is the rise and fall of groundwater level and abnormal changes in groundwater pressure. The fluctuation of groundwater level can lead to different degrees of interference in construction projects [5]. Usually, the stability of the groundwater level is poor, and smaller dynamic changes are inevitable, but if the dynamic changes are beyond the normal range, it will adversely affect the soil quality, resulting in the building can not maintain strong stability [6-9]. When the erosion reaches a certain degree, the probability that the area will collapse, resulting in the buildings above difficult to maintain the original stability [10-12]. The foundation directly affects the quality of the whole project, and the degree of change in groundwater pressure directly affects the foundation [13]. At the beginning of the groundwater pressure changes may appear foundation displacement, which will lead to a decline in the stability of the building, with the pressure worth increasing foundations may be uplifted [14-17]. If the foundation is affected, the role of the foundation will be difficult to play normally, which in turn affects the whole building, not only destroying the building structure, but also leading to a serious impact on the overall quality of the building [18-21]. Therefore, if you want to improve the quality of engineering construction and avoid the existence of safety hazards, you need to draw attention to the investigation of hydrogeological problems in the region.
In engineering geological investigations, the hazards brought by geological problems cannot be ignored. First, this paper utilizes the theory related to geostatistics and proposes a method for mobile collection and processing of engineering geological data based on mobile GIS technology. Secondly, a water supply project in South China is selected as a sample to analyze the hazards of geological problems during engineering geological investigations using real measurements. Through the analysis of borehole sampling and resistivity tests, it was concluded that the groundwater and soil layers are corrosive. According to the karst phenomenon found in the investigation, the research was targeted at rock permeability, and water pressure and water injection tests were carried out for different stratigraphic lithology. Finally, based on the statistical analysis of the existing research data, the basic law of rock permeability was derived.
Mobile data collection process The purpose of the mobile data acquisition system is to replace the traditional paper-and-pencil recording method for survey field data and improve efficiency of survey data acquisition through information acquisition. The specific workflow of the mobile acquisition system is shown in Figure 1. It makes full use of the mobile terminal’s advantages of mobility and intelligence, and incorporates multimedia data such as rock sample photography and description recording to provide more basis for subsequent data review. Call the GPS function of the mobile device in the field collection to assist the field drilling placement and improve the accuracy. The engineering files collected in the field work are remotely and in real-time back to the server in the internal work room, avoiding the manual entry in the traditional work mode, which greatly improves work efficiency. Mobile data collection The mobile data acquisition system realizes the acquisition entry, editing and deletion of attributes and spatial data of engineering geological data such as soil layer, marking penetration, dynamic probing, sampling and other engineering geological data on the iPad by reading the data from the engineering database file, and then utilizing the ArcGIS API for iOS through the data conversion and the importation of engineering data. Each data operation of the system will be recorded in the log to provide a basis for subsequent data review. Outside work assistance In this paper, through the AGSGPS class provided by the ArcGIS for iOS development kit, the GPS information of the mobile device can be read to obtain the current location information and positioning accuracy of the device. The current position is marked and displayed as a blue dot in the map on the AGSMapView map control, and the light blue circle around the blue origin is used to react to the positioning accuracy of the current position. The setting of the system’s automatic update mode is determined by the value of AGSGPSAutoPanMode. FTP Remote Data Transfer Service The system is designed to perform geotechnical engineering surveys internally and externally in parallel to improve efficiency. In the actual engineering application, the engineering geological data collected by the external industry should be transmitted back to the internal industry room in real time for the internal industry personnel to process and use, so as to realize the synchronous operation. Therefore, there is a need to design a network file transfer server for remote encrypted transmission and secure reception of files. FTP (File Transfer Protocol) is powerful, efficient in transmission, carries a large amount of data, reduces or eliminates the incompatibility of processing files under different operating systems, improves file sharing, allows files to have access privileges, ensures data security, ensures the storage of file formats, and is very suitable for transmitting engineering geological data files with high confidentiality and large amounts of data. In this paper, we use the FTP protocol to remotely transfer the completed engineering files collected from the mobile end to the data server.

External Data Acquisition Process
By a regionalized variable we mean a random field with three rectangular coordinates
G. Matron defines a regionalized variable as: a real function with a numerical value in space which takes a definite value at each point in space, i.e., the value of the function changes when moving from one point to the next. From a geological point of view, regionalized variables have the following properties:
Spatial limitation: that is, it is limited to a specific space (e.g., within a certain geological unit), which is called the geometrical domain of regionalization, and the regionalized variable is defined in terms of geometrical support. Continuity: different regionalized variables have different continuity, and this continuity is described by the variation function between adjacent samples. Anisotropy: regionalized variables are called isotropic when they have the same properties in all directions, otherwise they are called anisotropic. Correlation: spatial correlation within a certain range and to a certain extent, when beyond this range the correlation is weakened or even disappears. For any regionalized variable, special variability can be superimposed on the general pattern.
In geostatistical research, the variation function is used to represent the spatial structure of the regionalized variables within the statistical range, and when calculating the variation function, it is necessary to have a number of samples of the pair of regionalized variables Smooth assumption Let there be a random function
When holds, then this random function
A regionalized variable is said to satisfy second-order smoothness when it satisfies the following two conditions:
The expectation of the regionalized variable The spatial covariance function of the regionalized variables exists and is smooth throughout the study area:
When
That is, it has finite prior variance.
A smooth covariance means that the variance and variance functions are smooth.
Implications assumption In practice, sometimes the covariance function does not exist, and thus there is no finite a priori variance, that is, it can not satisfy the second-order smooth assumption mentioned above, for example, some natural phenomena and stochastic functions, which are infinitely discrete, that is, there is no covariance and no a priori variance but there is a variance function, in this case, we can relax the conditions, such as only considering the increment of grade without considering the grade itself, which is the basic idea of the assumption of entailment. A regionalized variable The mathematical expectation of the increment The variance function of the increment
That is, the variance of the regionalized variable
The implication assumption can be understood as follows: the increment
where
A random function is said to obey the quasi-smooth (or quasi-implicit) assumption if it is smooth (or implicit) only in a neighborhood of finite size (e.g., a range with a radius of
To put it simply, geological map is a symbolic display of geological spatial objects in a certain spatial and temporal range selected for specific purposes and transferred on a map according to certain mathematical laws. The geological spatial objects here are the abstraction of two types of elements, namely, geological units and geological structures with spatial geometry and geological properties such as the composition of earth materials, which can be displayed on the two-dimensional plane of GIS. The selection of geological spatial objects is essentially a process of cartographic synthesis, or filtered according to certain geological attributes (such as stratigraphy, lithology, geological age, etc.) standards, or filtered according to the standard of map scale range, or both standards are followed.
Due to the complexity of the real geological world and the limitations of human understanding, the elements and contents to be represented in a geological map are often complex, and the basic composition model of a geological map is shown in Figure 2.

Basic composition model of geological map
Each closed circle in the model of Figure 2 represents each type of object or part thereof. Spatial objects are digital abstractions of geologic elements (geologic units and formations) that can be observed in the real geologic world with geometric features, and can be typically displayed as points, lines, and surfaces on two-dimensional maps; descriptive data are the geologic attributes and characteristics of geologic elements represented by the spatial objects, which include concrete and visible physical features, such as color, outcrop form, texture, and chemical composition, metamorphic features, geologic age, geologic genesis, etc., invisible to the naked eye; map legends are used to extract similar (categorized) objects or parts of the spatial objects. These features include specific visible physical characteristics, such as color, outcrop form, texture, and invisible chemical composition, metamorphic features, geological age, geological genesis, etc. The map legend is used to extract similar (classified) spatial objects for symbolic display, and the legend also includes the scope of the map, the scale, the classification criteria used, and the corresponding display symbols for each type of spatial object.
The intersection of spatial objects and description data is a single spatial object with geometric and attribute description data, the intersection of description data and map legend is data classification according to description attributes, and the intersection of spatial objects and map legend is spatial classification according to spatial object types.
The map is the intersection of spatial objects and their description data and map legend, and also the intersection of individual spatial objects, spatial classification and data classification, and it is the visualization of the real geological world on the geological map.
The conceptual model of GIS-based geological map is shown in Figure 3. The real geological world in large scale also includes geological entities and geological phenomena, which correspond to two types of geological spatial objects: stratigraphic units and medium-sized and small tectonic structures with spatial geometrical features, respectively. Geological formations and stratigraphic units are closely connected, and common geological formations, such as folds, fractures, orientation and tendency of rock strata, and production patterns, are represented on the map by corresponding symbols, while stratigraphic units, such as chronostratigraphic strata, veins, caves, and subterranean springs (hot springs), etc., are represented on the map by corresponding class symbols. Geological symbols are very important legend items that, together with other map legends, base maps, map projections, spatial reference systems, scales, etc., make up a geological map.

Conceptual model of geological map based on GIS
Adopting ontological ideas, spatial dimensional analysis of geospatial objects is facilitated to model, store, analyze and display geologic objects in GIS two-dimensional space. Including zero-dimensional, one-dimensional, two-dimensional and three-dimensional types, the spatial dimensional analysis of the geological body is shown in Figure 4.

Spatial dimension analysis of geological body
Zero-dimensional objects: various point objects, such as mine shafts, caves, underground springs, production points and other geological point objects;
One-dimensional objects: arc segments, line-like objects, such as fracture lines, rock strike, etc;
Two-dimensional objects: faceted objects, such as stratigraphic surfaces (usually represented by TIN data and GRID data models), various cross-sections, outcrop stratigraphic distributions, and so on;
Three-dimensional objects: divided into regular body class and irregular body class, where the regular body class such as spheres, cylinders and prisms, etc., irregular body is very complex (such as stratigraphic units), but can be expressed on its surface or section (section). Three-dimensional objects are currently difficult to store and analyze in a general GIS system, but can be visualized with the help of surface modeling.
At present, geological maps have adopted GIS technology to realize digital geological maps, and accordingly, geological spatial databases for various thematic applications can be established to realize the unified management of spatial objects and descriptive data based on the latest GIS object-oriented data model. In the application of traditional mapping, the efficiency of geological map production and drawing has been greatly improved in the updating of geological map data and the production and printing of paper maps, realizing a revolutionary leap in map production and printing technology. Meanwhile, in the application of geological information analysis, the geological spatial database based on GIS can be visualized, managed and analyzed on geological maps with the help of GIS tools, which can solve the application problems in many fields such as resource exploration and geological environment.
This paper is selected as a water supply project in South China as a real object to analyze and study the hazards of geological problems in engineering geological investigations.
The average annual water intake of a water supply project is 5.2m3/s, the designed pipeline diversion flow is 150 million m3, and the engineering category is Class II. The project includes 3 levels of secondary buildings and 2 levels of main buildings. The groundwater in the area is mainly porous submersible and contains part of bedrock fissure water, the former exists in the loose accumulations of the fourth system, and the latter is stored in the bedrock fissures, surface water and atmospheric precipitation are the main recharge sources of porous submersible, and seepage from the upper layer of porous submersible is the main source of recharge of bedrock fissure water, combined with the borehole exploration report, the depth of groundwater in the area ranges from 0.5 to 5.9 m. The groundwater depth of the project is 0.5~5.9m.
Groundwater samples were taken from boreholes at three locations in the project area: point A, point B and point C. The samples were analyzed in accordance with the relevant investigation standards. The corrosivity of the water samples obtained from the analysis according to the relevant investigation standards is shown in Table 1. From Table 1, it is concluded that the concrete structure is moderately corroded by surface water and groundwater, the steel structure is weakly corroded by surface water and groundwater, and the reinforcing bars in the concrete will not be corroded by both.
Test results of groundwater corrosion to different structures in the site
| Water sampling collection point | Type of material | Steel structure | Steel bars in reinforced concrete | Concrete | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sulfate type | Magnesium ionic type | Bicarbonate type | Carbonic type | General acid type | ||||
| Test index | Cl-1+SO42-content mg·L-1 | Cl-1 content after conversion mg·L-1 | SO42- content mg·L-1 | Mg2+ content mg·L-1 | HCO3-content mmol·L-1 | Aggressive CO2 content mg·L-1 | pH value | |
| Point A | Measured value | 42 | 13 | 20 | 1 | 0.69 | 18 | 6.3 |
| Corrosion degree | Mild corrosion | Non-corrosive | Non-corrosive | Non-corrosive | Moderate corrosion | Mild corrosion | Mild corrosion | |
| Point B | Measured value | 40 | 14 | 21 | 2 | 0.48 | 5 | 6.2 |
| Corrosion degree | Mild corrosion | Non-corrosive | Non-corrosive | Non-corrosive | Moderate corrosion | Non-corrosive | Mild corrosion | |
| Point C | Measured value | 36 | 19 | 24 | 3 | 0.55 | 14 | 6.5 |
| Corrosion degree | Mild corrosion | Non-corrosive | Non-corrosive | Non-corrosive | Moderate corrosion | Mild corrosion | Mild corrosion | |
Visual resistivity tests were carried out on the transmission pipeline laying lines as shown in Table 2.
Corrosion of soil along the pipeline to steel structure
| Hole number | Soil layer category | Depth of measuring point/m | Corrosion grade | Apparent resistivity /Ω·m |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ZKY35 | Muck | 4 | Strong corrosion | 4.8 |
| 5 | Strong corrosion | 3.1 | ||
| 6 | Strong corrosion | 2.1 | ||
| 7 | Strong corrosion | 1.9 | ||
| 8 | Strong corrosion | 2.1 | ||
| ZKB15 | Silty clay | 4 | microcorrosion | 293 |
| 6 | microcorrosion | 226 | ||
| Sandy silty clay | 8 | microcorrosion | 239 |
From Table 2, the pipeline laying line on the soil on the steel structure has a slightly ~ strong corrosive, so in the construction of the project should be the implementation of anti-corrosion measures for water pipelines.
In this paper, through the investigation, a total of five bad geologic bodies, numbered 1~5, were found within the survey area, and the location and burial depth of each bad geologic body on the survey line are shown in Table 3.
Distribution of geophysical anomalies
| ID | Position | Burial depth(m) | Anomalous body height(m) | Anomalous body type |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | L1-19-L1-22 | 6.9 | 1.5 | Joint fissure and dissolution development area |
| L2-25-L2-28 | 5.7 | 1.5 | ||
| 2 | L3-10-L3-12 | 5.6 | 1.4 | Joint fissure and dissolution development area |
| L4-10-L4-12 | 6.1 | 0.5 | ||
| L5-10-L512 | 5.4 | 1.6 | ||
| 3 | L5-16-L5-17 | 5.2 | 2.9 | Joint fissure and dissolution development area |
| L6-16-L6-17 | 11.3 | 1.8 | ||
| 4 | L9-25-L9-30 | 5.8 | 3.2 | Joint fissure and dissolution development area |
| L10-27-L10-29 | 5.6 | 3.5 | ||
| L11-28-L11-30 | 7.1 | 3.4 | ||
| 5 | L7-11-L7-15 | 6.6 | 6.7 | Joint fissure and dissolution development area |
| L8-23-L8-30 | 5.3 | 3.3 | ||
| L9-21-L9-26 | 6.9 | 7.5 | ||
| L10-22-L10-36 | 6.0 | 7.2 | ||
| L11-21-L11-26 | 6.1 | 5.4 |
As can be seen from Table 3, No.1 anomaly is inferred to be a jointed fissure development area.
Anomaly No.2 is inferred to be an area of nodal fissure and dissolution development, dominated by nodal fissure development, and there is dissolution development phenomenon near the L4 line, and there may be dissolution holes in the underlying rock layer.
Anomaly No.3 is inferred to be an area of nodal fissure and dissolution development, dominated by nodal fissure development, and there may be cavities in the underlying rock layer near the L5 line.
Anomaly No. 4 is inferred to be an area of jointed fissure and dissolution development, mainly characterized by jointed fissure development, and there may be cavities in the underlying rock layer in individual areas within the scope of the anomaly.
Anomaly No.5 is inferred to be an area of nodal fissure and dissolution development, dominated by nodal fissure development, with dissolution development phenomenon near line L11, and cavities exist in the underlying rock layer, which have been exposed on the surface, and the size of the development of the cavities is inferred to be about 6.2m in the north-south direction, 3.1m in the east-west direction, and the depth of the cavities is about 8.2m, and the development of dissolution phenomenon is inferred to exist near line L8, and there are probably cavities in the underlying rock layer.
It can be seen that the adverse geology developed in the site is karst, where groundwater interacts with dissolvable rocks, leading to rock dissolution.
In order to find out the water permeability of various types of rock bodies in the water transmission tunnel of this water supply project, water pressure and water injection tests were carried out near the depth of the tunnel for different stratigraphic lithologies during the preliminary stage of investigation, except for the shallow depth near the inlet, where the lithology is strongly weathered rock, and the rest of the tunnel body is mostly weakly weathered rock, and locally, slightly weathered rock. Table 4 displays the water permeability statistics for the rock near the cave body.
Permeability statistics of rock mass near the cave body
| Stratigraphic age | Lithology | Degree of weathering | Hole number | Hole bottom buried depth/m | Depth of test section/m | Permeability coefficient /(cm·s-1) | Water permeability q/Lu | Average value/Lu | Water permeability |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| P2β | Basalt | Strong weathering | ZK15 | 15.1 | 0~10 | 3.21×10-4 | 2.03×10-4 | Medium permeability | |
| 10~20 | 1.25×10-4 | ||||||||
| 20~30 | 1.64×10-4 | ||||||||
| Mild weathering | ZKB02 | 59.2 | 40~50 | 2.51 | 1.43 | Weakly permeable | |||
| 50~60 | 0.94 | Slightly permeable | |||||||
| 60~70 | 2.85 | Weakly permeable | |||||||
| P1q+m | Limestone | Mild weathering | ZKB02 | 82.6 | 70~80 | q>120 | q>100 | Extremely permeable | |
| 80~90 | 0.15 | 0.15 | Slightly permeable | ||||||
| 90~100 | q>120 | q>100 | Extremely permeable |
According to Table 4, within the range of 5 times the diameter of the cave body and the roof, the strongly weathered bedrock is mostly moderately permeable, and locally may be strongly permeable; the weakly weathered bedrock is divided into basalt and chert, among which, the weakly weathered basalt is generally slightly-weakly permeable, while the chert is generally very strongly permeable, and the individual segments with better integrity are slightly-weakly permeable, but it is unrepresentative.
In water conservation and hydropower projects, the permeability of rock bodies is generally expressed by the result of water pressure tests, which is called rock body permeability (q), which is the unit of Lu Rong (Lu). 1Lu means that the flow rate of water pressed into the rock body is 1.0L/s for 1m of rock body under the pressure of 1MPa.
The permeability characteristics of the rock body in accordance with its 2 × 4 × 3 = 24 categories, in order to further analyze the permeability of the rock body, this paper according to a basin 25 water conservancy and hydropower projects of 4561 groups of rock body of the results of the water pressure test data, statistics to get the results of the permeability of the different categories of rock body as shown in Table 5 and Table 6.
Results of water permeability of rock mass (Class a) containing soluble salt
| Lithologic association | Rock permeability (Lu) and number of statistical groups (sections) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | Designation | Strong weathering | Statistical group number | Mild weathering | Statistical group number | Fresh | Statistical group number |
| Sandstone group | 1 | 62.5 | 8 | 41 | 15 | 19.8 | 59 |
| Sand-mudstone interbedded class | 2 | 28.9 | 15 | 28.9 | 22 | 21 | 150 |
| Argillaceous rock with sandstone | 3 | 37 | 19 | 61 | 1 | 10.4 | 28 |
| Argillaceous rocks | 4 | 48.0 | 74 | 38 | 290 | 9.5 | 1034 |
Results of water permeability of common rock mass (Class b)
| Lithologic association | Rock permeability (Lu) and number of statistical groups (sections) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | Designation | Strong weathering | Statistical group number | Mild weathering | Statistical group number | Fresh | Statistical group number |
| Sandstone group | 1 | 32.6 | 41 | 21.8 | 93 | 5.35 | 237 |
| Sand-mudstone interbedded class | 2 | 30.8 | 62 | 18.3 | 86 | 6.01 | 513 |
| Argillaceous rock with sandstone | 3 | 21 | 17 | 28 | 5 | 3.18 | 28 |
| Argillaceous rocks | 4 | 29.4 | 74 | 19.4 | 321 | 3.91 | 1369 |
The statistical results in Table 5 and Table 6 show that:
The permeability of similar rock bodies containing soluble rock fractions is greater than that of rock bodies without soluble salt fractions, which is due to the karst-like action of the anastase-containing rock bodies. The permeability is decreasing with the increase of mudstone-like rocks in different lithological combinations of the rock body from class 1 to class 4. Rock body weathering state class on the permeability of the rock has a greater impact, from strong weathering rock, weak weathering, fresh rock body permeability of the overall reduction of the trend is obvious.
The relationship between water permeability (q) and lithology and weathering state of different rock bodies is shown in Figure 5.

Different permeability, lithology and weathering state of rock mass
From the figure, it can be seen that the fresh rock bodies are weakly permeable rock bodies with permeability less than 5Lu except for sandstone and sandstone-mudstone interbedded with soluble rock with permeability greater than 5Lu; while the strongly weathered and weakly weathered rock bodies, whether it is a class a or b, have permeability ranging from 20 to 80Lu, which is moderately permeable rock bodies.
It can be concluded that near-surface weathered rock bodies are generally moderately permeable and fresh rock bodies are generally weakly permeable, and the permeability characteristics of rock bodies have a “shell-core binary” structure from the weathered rock bodies within the weathered crust near the surface to the fresh rock bodies underneath them. The weathered rock mass is a permeable “shell”, and the fresh rock mass is a relatively impermeable “core”, this structure is determined by the geological process formed by the permeable zone of the alluvial rock mass, in the investigation and design of rock mass leakage and seepage prevention, as long as the permeability characteristics of the permeable “shell” and the upper boundary of the relatively impervious “core” can be analyzed and calculated accordingly and the anti-seepage design can be carried out.
This paper is selected as a water supply project in south China as the actual object, the hazards of geological problems in engineering geological investigation is analyzed, and the research is carried out for the rock leakage problem.
The data show that the concrete structure is subject to moderate corrosion by surface water and groundwater, the steel structure is subject to weak corrosion by surface water and groundwater, the steel reinforcement in the concrete will not be subject to corrosion by both, and the soil on the pipeline laying line has a slight~strong corrosive effect on the steel structure. At the same time, a total of five karst phenomena were found within the survey area.
Pressure water and water injection tests were carried out to address the rock permeability problem, and the average value of water permeability of strongly weathered bedrock was 2.03×10-4Lu, which is moderately permeable. Weakly weathered bedrock is divided into two types: basalt and graywacke, among which the average value of permeability of weakly weathered basalt is 1.43Lu, which is generally slightly-weakly permeable. The average permeability value of graywacke is more than 100Lu, which is very high.
By statistically analyzing 4561 sets of existing research data, it is concluded that the permeability of fresh rock bodies is less than 5Lu, which belongs to weakly permeable rock bodies, except for the permeability of sandstone and sandstone-mudstone interbedded with soluble rock, which is more than 5Lu. The permeability of strongly weathered and weakly weathered rock bodies is between 20 and 80 Lu, which is a medium permeable rock body. The permeability characteristics of the rock bodies range from the weathered rock bodies within the weathered crust near the surface to the fresh rock bodies underneath, and their permeability has a “shell-core binary” structure.
