Determination of rock foundation levels for the expansión of the Cañaveral – Colombia shopping center, based on geophysical tests and their correlation with direct exploration

The Cañaveral shopping center is located on a low slope formed by recent alluvial deposits of low consistency, supported on sedimentary rock of the Girón formation, which is found at depths that change abruptly between one and twelve meters in short distances, influenced by the presence of a geological fault line and processes of erosion and weathering by subway water currents. Considering that the loads on the foundation are of great magnitude, it is necessary to build about 100 deep caisson foundations to reach the rock. However, performing a borehole on each one of them represented a very high cost and long execution times that would generate discomfort in the operation of the warehouse. Therefore, an alternative was proposed to determine the depth levels of the rock through different geophysical tests of seismic lines and electrical tomography and try to calibrate the results through the correlation of some boreholes. During the execution and data processing phase of the geophysical tests, difficulties were encountered due to the level of environmental noise and the obtaining of the wave records, given the variability of the rock levels and even the effect that in some sectors of the study area the rock is very sub-surface. In conclusion, it was possible to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each of the exploration methods and generate a 3D map of the depths of the rock levels that served as input for the design and budget of the foundations, which were verified by constant supervision during construction and thus be able to determine the error percentages, as well as to present recommendations for future works where it is intended to use this type of techniques.