ASCE has honored Idil D. Akin, Ph.D., A.M.ASCE; Taiwo O. Akinleye, S.M.ASCE; and Peter R. Robichaud, Ph.D., P.E., M.ASCE, with the 2025 Thomas A. Middlebrooks Award for the paper “Changes in Soil Properties over Time after a Wildfire and Implications to Slope Stability,” Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering, July 2023.
The paper is a pioneering study that demonstrates that post-wildfire slope stability changes over time after a wildfire because of temporal changes in soil properties and mechanical and hydrologic soil behavior. The authors questioned the use of existing approaches for a slope stability analysis and showed the need for a wildfire-specific slope stability model and importance of in situ monitoring of critical slopes.
Post-wildfire slope stability is a global concern because of the worldwide increase in wildfire occurrence and severity due to climate change. Landslides triggered by wildfires are natural hazards that pose threats not only to human life and infrastructure, but also to ecosystems. The increased incidences of wildfires followed by heavy rainfall or rapid snowmelt has made hillslopes more susceptible to wetting-induced shallow landslides. Currently, a wildfire-specific slope stability model does not exist because of a lack of understanding of the effects of wildfires on soils and hillslopes.
This study provides the first data showing the effects of wildfires on soils and hillslopes, thereby improving our understanding of dynamic forest environments after a wildfire. The insights from the paper can lead to the development of a wildfire-specific slope stability model.
This paper also showed the importance of in situ water retention monitoring in critical slopes burned by wildfires. The instrumentation system used in this study can be adopted by stakeholders and engineers to monitor the stability of critical slopes after wildfires to perform a risk analysis and reduce the consequence of landslides.
The Thomas A. Middlebrooks Award recognizes a paper published by the Society for its merit as a contribution to geotechnical engineering.
