Side-Resistance Criterion for Onset of Mechanical Ice-Cover Breakup

The mechanical breakup of an ice cover during spring season may lead to ice-dam formation.However, the method of predicting ice-cover breakup based on mechanical principle has been lack of.According to the principle of hydrodynamics and solid mechanics,based upon the residual shear strength of ice cover at crack near riverbanks,a side-resistance criterion is presented,which can be used to appropriately forecast the onset of ice cover breakup.Field observations,including the date of ice breakup,the width of river,flow discharge and the thickness of ice cover of Yellow River at Hequ reach,are further used to analyze and ascertain the critical value of residual shear strength of ice cover at crack near riverbanks.The result of this study shows that there is little inter-annual change of shear stress at the crack.