Seismically induced acceleration of deep-seated creep in the complex Monte Saresano landslide

Beatrice Carrozzo; Giuseppe Dattola; Riccardo Castellanza; Nicoletta Fusi; Matteo Ciantia; Giovanni Crosta

doi:10.4408/IJEGE.2026-01.S-04

Authors

Beatrice Carrozzo Università degli studi di Milano-Bicocca, Italy https://orcid.org/0009-0004-9146-9249
Giuseppe Dattola Università degli studi di Milano-Bicocca, Italy https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6026-0064
Riccardo Castellanza Università degli studi di Milano-Bicocca, Italy https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8591-1978
Nicoletta Fusi Università degli studi di Milano-Bicocca, Italy https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8712-8469
Matteo Ciantia University of Dundee, United Kingdom https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1897-4471
Giovanni Crosta Università degli studi di Milano-Bicocca, Italy https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3002-3188

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.4408/IJEGE.2026-01.S-04

Keywords:

rockslide, reactivation, low-magnitude earthquakes, integrated monitoring, geomechanics, long-term post-seismic creep, 3D Finite Element Analysis

Abstract

The Monte Saresano landslide (Tavernola Bergamasca, Italy), is a large rockslide (up to 4.5 million m3) along the slope of an old quarry, with at least three reactivation stages since 1900. In February 2021, after a seismic event of ML=2.2 that occurred 2 km east of the municipality of Viadanica (BG approximately 7 km west of the landslide site, the entire monitoring network has recorded a significant acceleration of the movement with displacement rate of 6.34-11.23 mm/day compared to 0.1-0.2 mm/day before the event. This study uses a variety of approaches, through the analysis of monitoring data from a comprehensive monitoring network (active mostly since 2017), laboratory geomechanical characterization of the materials (UCS, TCS, BTS, LTS), compositional investigations (XRF, XRD, thin sections), geophysical and borehole data, has allowed the identification of 2.6 million m3 unstable mass, potentially extending to 4.45 million m3 Using these results, a 3D Finite Element Analysis (FEA) was implemented to study the slope stability. The numerical results, suggest the presence of widespread fracturing and severely weakened cataclastic levels developed from prehistorical activity. Such weakened planes have been reactivated by recent quarrying activites and the 2021 seismic event.