This research program is part of the initiative to collect perishable data resulting from the 17 October 1989 Northern California (Loma Prieta) earthquake. The objective is to obtain data on soil failures in the Marina District of San Francisco: this perishable data will be analyzed at a later date with the objective of developing a simple and efficient technique to assess the stability and displacement of liquefied soils. The observations are designed to provide data on ground failures which can lead to answers to the following questions: 1. Are sand boils related to the damage caused by liquefaction? 2. Do the sand boils in the Marina District form a pattern or are they randomly distributed? 3. Is there a relation between the superficial ground displacement, soil profile and the size of the sand boils, their relative spatial frequency and distribution? 4. Is it possible to reconstruct the failure mechanisms within soil layers by examining the sand boils?
