Consolidation and permeability characteristics of high-porosity surficial sediments in Eckernforde Bay

Back-pressured, constant-rate-of-deformation consolidation, and permeability tests were conducted on 21 ''undisturbed'' samples from Eckernforde Bay in the Baltic Sea. The soft fine-grained sediments have very high in-situ void ratios and are highly compressible. The compression index decreases slightly in the upper 40 cm but remains essentially unchanged below 40 cm at an average value of 3.5 to a depth of 260 cm. Recompression indices range from 5 to 19% of the virgin indices. The preconsolidation stress is consistently higher than the overburden stress, particularly near the surface. Permeabilities at in situ void ratios vary between 3 x 10(-4) and 10(-6) cm s(-1), with the relationship between void ratio and the logarithm of permeability being linear.