ABSTRACT
Germanovich (2003, 2005). The basic idea of the mechanism is that a shear band emerges along a certain length of the potential failure surface. Within this shear band the shear strength drops due to the softening behaviour of the material. Therefore, the soil above this weakened zone starts moving downwards, causing the shear band to propagate further along the potential failure surface. This produces an initial landslide velocity already before the slide reached the state of the global limiting equilibrium; i.e. the post failure stage. Analysis of the mechanism is based on the energy balance approach of Palmer & Rice (1973): for the shear band to propagate the energy surplus produced in the body by an incremental propagation of the shear band should exceed the energy required for this propagation. The main advantage of this model is that it allows distinguishing between progressive and catastrophic shear band propagation and treats the shear band as a true physical process and not just as a mathematical bifurcation problem (Rudnicky & Rice 1975).
