New technology for predicting the performance of earth (soil and rock) spillways has been developed throughthe joint efforts of the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS). Thistechnology has been computer coded, and the resulting computational model incorporated into NRCS software. As a partof evaluating the potential for spillway breach, one component of this model predicts headcut advance within the spillway.This component utilizes an energy-based parameter to describe the erosive attack and a headcut erodibility index todescribe the resistance of the geologic materials to that attack. Headcut advance threshold and rate parameters werecalibrated using data from field spillways that had experienced extreme flow events. The model was validated using datafrom additional field spillways. Results of the validation suggest that the model should provide a useful tool for currentuse, but that additional data and model refinement are needed.
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Temple et al. (1997) studied this question.