A Geology for

Engineers
Seventh Edition

F . G . H . B l y t h Ph.D., D.i.e., F.G.S.

Emeritus Reader in Engineering Geology,
Imperial College of Science and Technology, London

M . H . de F r e i t a s M.i.Geoi., Ph.D., p.i.c, F.G.S.

Senior Lecturer in Engineering Geology,
Imperial College of Science and Technology, London

ELSEVIER
BUTTERWORTH
HEINEMANN

AMSTERDAM BOSTON HEIDELBERG LONDON NEW YORK OXFORD

PARIS SAN DIEGO SAN FRANCISCO SINGAPORE SYDNEY TOKYO
Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann
Linacre House, Jordan Hill, Oxford 0 X 2 8DP
30 Corporate Drive, Burlington, MA 01803

First published in Great Britain 1943

Seventh edition by Edward Arnold 1984
Reprinted with amendments by Arnold 1986
Reprinted by Butterworth-Heinemann 2003, 2005

Copyright © 1984, F G H Blyth and M H de Freitas. All rights reserved.

The right of F G H Blyth and M H de Freitas to be identified as the authors

of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs
and Patents Act 1988.

No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form

(including photocopying or storing in any medium by electronic means
and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this
publication) without the written permission of the copyright holder except
in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act 1988 or under the terms of a licence issued by the Copyright Licensing
Agency Ltd, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London, England W1T 4LP.
Applications for the copyright holder's written permission to reproduce
any part of this publication should be addressed to the publisher.

Permissions may be sought directly from Elsevier's Science and Technology

Rights Department in Oxford, UK; phone: (+44) (0) 1865 843830;
fax: (+44) (0) 1865 853333; e-mail: permissions@elsevier.co.uk. You may also
complete your request on-line via the Elsevier homepage
(http://www.elsevier.com), by selecting 'Customer Support' and then
'Obtaining Permissions'.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Blyth, F G H
A geology for engineers.-7th ed
1. Engineering geology
I. Title II. De Freitas, MH
551\024624 TA705

ISBN 0 7131 2882 8

! For information on all Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann |

publications visit our web site at www.bh.com

Working together to grow

libraries in developing countries
www.elsevier.com | www.bookaid.org | www.sabre.org

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Biddies Ltd, King's Lynn, Norfolk
Preface
The Seventh Edition of A Geology for Engineers has been
written to provide students of engineering with a recent
text in geology for use during their first degree in Civil
Engineering or Mining. As with previous editions, we
have attempted to explain both the subject of geology
and its relevance to engineering work in rock and soil.
This edition also provides a text which will complement
other courses that student engineers attend, such as those
in rock and soil mechanics, ground-water flow, and urban
development. To achieve these ends the text has been
completely revised and much extended. Three new chap-
ters have been written and the structure and content of
former chapters have been substantially changed. Much
attention has been devoted to the quality of illustrations
and tabulated data, and most of the artwork has been
redrawn. SI units have been used throughout the text.
For the teacher we have provided the Seventh Edition
with three features which we hope will be of assistance to
a course of geology for engineers that is restricted to a
limited number of lectures and practicals, and the occa-
sional visit to an engineering site.
The first feature is the structure of the book, which has
been divided into two parts of approximately equal
length. Chapters 1 to 8 inclusive are concerned with
fundamental aspects of Earth geology, its processes and
products, as would normally be presented to student en-
gineers in thefirstpart of their tuition in geology. Chapter
9 reviews the mechanical properties of geological
materials and is designed to supplement the more exten-
sive courses of soil and rock mechanics that the students
will be attending at this stage in their degree studies. We
hope this Chapter will be of assistance in illustrating the
range of behaviour that may be exhibited by rocks and
soils; it does not show how these properties are incorpor-
ated into engineering design, such considerations being
more appropriately dealt with by conventional courses of
rock and soil mechanics. Chapters 10 to 18 inclusive
represent the second part of the book and consider sub-
jects where the influence of geology upon engineering
work may be clearly demonstrated. These chapters are
intended to support the lectures on ground-investigation,
slope stability, excavations and hydrology that students
will be attending as part of their course in engineering.
Numerous references have been provided to assist the
teacher locate further details.
The second feature of the book concerns its illustra-
tions. Most are line drawings of a type which can be
reproduced easily as transparencies for projection during
lectures and practicals. Many of the drawings illustrate
in a simple manner the fundamental aspects of complex
geological processes and materials. This material has been
designed for teachers who wish to use the text either to
introduce particular subjects of a lecture or to precede the
projection of their own transparencies of real situations
and materials. Many of the line drawings contain more
information than is revealed in either their caption or the
text and will enable a variety of topics to be illustrated to
a class.
The third feature we hope will be of help to the teacher
is the support the text provides for practical work in the
laboratory and in the field. The chapters devoted to mi-
nerals, rocks and geological maps have been carefully
structured and illustrated to assist students with their
independent work, so that they may proceed with the
description and identification of minerals and rocks, with
map reading and interpretation, and with the construc-
tion of cross-sections, after they have received initial guid-
ance from their tutor. Visits to site may be introduced
with the aid of the chapters describing ground investiga-
tion and laboratory testing, and much of the material in
the Chapters devoted to ground-water, slopes, dams and
reservoirs, excavations and ground treatment, is con-
cerned with illustrating ground conditions that are rarely
visible on site but are the cause of much engineering work.
For the student we have incorporated into the Seventh
Edition three features that are in addition to those men-
tioned above.
The first is the general form of the text. All editions of
A Geology for Engineers have been written for students
who are studying geology to become good engineers. We
have tried to select those aspects of geology which are
likely to be most relevant for both an appreciation of the
subject and the safe practice of civil and mining engineer-
ing. Scientific terminology has been moderated to provide
a comprehensive vocabulary of geological terms which
will satisfy the requirements of most engineers. Each geo-
logical term is explained and indexed and many terms
describing geological processes, structures and materials
are illustrated. By these means we hope that the Seventh
Edition will enable the student engineer to communicate
with his tutors and with geologists and geotechnical en-
gineers, and to understand the terminology that is com-
monly used in geological and geotechnical literature.
The second feature we have provided to aid the student
is a comprehensive system of headings and sub-headings.
Many readers will know nothing of geology and will
require clear guidance on the scope and content of its
various parts. Each chapter therefore contains a system
of headings that will reveal the content and extent of the
subject and the relationship between its components. Per-
sonal study may therefore commence with a rapid assess-
ment of a topic, gained by turning the pages and reading
the headings.
The third feature is the provision of material that will
assist the student to become acquainted with other
sources of geological and geotechnical information. Each
chapter concludes with a Selected Bibliography of texts
which a student engineer should find of interest and be
able to comprehend. Because some of these texts will
prove more difficult to understand than others many of
the illustrations in the present edition have been drawn to
explain the subject of a chapter and to assist an apprecia-
tion of more advanced work recorded in the Proceedings
of Professional and Learned Societies to which the stu-
dent engineer may subscribe as either a Junior or Associ-
ate Member. Reference to selected case histories has also
been given as far as space has permitted.
In completing the Seventh Edition we wish to acknow-
ledge the help we have received from our many colleagues
around the world. In particular we want to thank the staff
of Imperial College for their assistance with so many
matters. We must also record our appreciation of the
work undertaken by the staff of Edward Arnold, who
have been our Publisher for so many years. The double
column format of this Edition has contained within
reasonable bounds a text much enlarged on previous
Editions.
London, 1984 F. G. H. Blyth
M.H. deFreitas