ABSTRACT
Rock mass is the total in-situ medium containing bedding planes, cracks, faults, joints, folds and other structural features. Rock slope, which is divided into many rock blocks by various discontinuities, is of static equilibrium state in nature stress field. This chapter provides an extension for the stereo-analytical method, called ‘the block-group method’. The stereo-analytical method can consider both convex and concave blocks, but a group of blocks, if considered as a whole, might indeed be unstable and more dangerous compared with individual key blocks. The key block method has been widely used in many projects for conducting quick analysis of rock mass media stability. The goal of block-group method is to analyze larger hazardous unstable group of blocks instead of just a few key blocks. The method can quickly determine the movement behavior and failure mode of blocks in key block-group. The main advantage of using the block-group method over the other discontinuous analysis methods lies in its processing speed.
