Tailings dams, as essential mining structures, are being built globally for containing the chief waste stream of the mining industry. Catastrophic tailings dam breaches have occurred frequently over the past decade, causing severe impacts on the environment, economy, and human health. The foreknowledge of the tailings dam breach overland flow is crucial for the risk assessment and emergency response planning in order to prevent or minimize possible losses. Using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) photogrammetry and smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) numerical method, this study proposed a multidisciplinary procedure for modelling a hypothetical tailings dam breach run out flow over the downstream complex terrain. A case study on a 97-m-height tailings dam in Shandong Province of China was carried out. The proposed procedure was proven applicable to determine the overland tailings flow. The submerged area and flow velocities suggested that the downstream G2 highway would hardly be threatened and more concerns should be paid on the factory plants and workers deployed between the dam toe and the highway. Additionally, the application of UAV photogrammetry in the mining industry as a supplementary surveying method can be further expanded, especially for the numerous small-scale mining sites. The proposed procedure is then recommended for the safety management of the tailings’ storage facilities globally.

Purpose: The paper aims to construct a method to simulate the relationship between the parameters of soil properties and the area of sliding mass of the true slip surface of a landslide. Design/methodology/approach: The smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) algorithm is used to calibrate a response surface function which is adopted to quantify the area of sliding mass of the true slip surface for each failure sample in Monte Carlo simulation. The proposed method is illustrated through a homogeneous and a heterogeneous cohesive soil slope. Findings: The comparison of the results between the proposed method and the traditional method using the slip surface with minimum factor of safety (FS_min) to quantify the failure consequence has shown that the landslide risk tends to be attributed to a variety of risk sources, and that the use of a slip surface with FS_min to quantify the consequence of a landslide underestimates the landslide risk value. The difference of the risk value between the proposed method and the traditional method increases dramatically as the uncertainty of soil properties becomes significant. Practical implications: A geotechnical engineer could use the proposed method to perform slope failure analysis. Originality/value: The failure consequence of a landslide can be rationally predicted using the proposed method.