Georgia’s mountainous territory and its climatic, geographical and geological environment create all the prerequisites for the spread of natural hazards across most of the country. Among them, landslides occupy a special place. Nowadays, there is almost no mountainous region where the population and industrial or agricultural facilities do not suffer damage from landslides ( Gaprindashvili et al., 2021 ; Varazashvili et al., 2024a ; Gaprindashvili et al., 2018 ; Tedoradze, 2019 ).

The above-mentioned natural hazard also poses significant threats to transport, especially to the Georgian Military Road along the right slope of Aragvi River Gorge ( Figure 1 ). It should also be noted that the functioning and capacity of this highway are very important not only for Georgia, but also for other countries in the Caucasus and the South. These loads have been further increased by the events of recent years and will probably increase even more in the future, for which our state must be prepared.

In this regard, it must be noted that the aforementioned transport corridor is located in a mountainous terrain. The landscape and geological conditions are comlicated, which plays a major role in the development of landslides, all of which negatively affects the safe operation of the road and often causes delays ( Figure 1 ).

One group of landslide events prevalent within the study area is concentrated in the vicinity of the Zhinvali Reservoir. They follow the right slope in a continuous line from the reservoir dam almost to the Ananuri fortress and are more or less actively embedded in the heads of erosional cuts formed on this slope, which are closely adjacent to the roadway ( Figure 2 ) and pose a threat to traffic. Therefore, by the decision of the authors of the article, this part of our research is dedicated to the area of development of the aforementioned landslide events.

Based on Administrative zoning, study area is located in Dusheti Municipalty, Mtskheta-Mtianeti Region. Morphologically is situated in moderate and high mountainous relief subzone, with erosive-tectonic ridges and gorges shown in Figure 2 , developed on upper Jurassic and Cretaceous suites.

According to climatic conditions, the study area is characterized by harsh winters and cool summers typical of the medium and high mountainous regions of the southern slopes of the Eastern Caucasus. The average annual temperature is 5 - 6 degrees, the maximum is 30 degrees, the minimum is - 32 degrees. Spring and early summer are characterized by sharp temperature fluctuations: While the average temperature in May does not exceed 8 - 10 degrees, on certain days it can reach 25 degree, which contributes to the rapid melting of snow, and the height of the snow cover exceeds 3.0 m in certain periods.

Another important climatic characteristic is the annual amount of precipitation, which is 1000 mm, especially the daily maximum of 100 - 110 mm, which creates one of the main forming conditions for debris/mudflows ( Construction Climatology, 2008 ).

Among the geological factors, the lithological structure is noteworthy. The study area is included in the Mestia-Tianeti tectonic zone and is represented by carbonate-terrigenous flysch of the Berriasian-Valanginian and Hotrivian stages. These layers are built up of clastic limestones and sandstones, turbidites, pelagic marls, limestones, mudstones and shales. Rocks of such geological structure easily succumb to weathering processes, which creates an important prerequisite for the formation of landslide-erosion centers at the head of this valley ( Gaprindashvili et al., 2021 ; Varazashvili et al., 2024b ; Lomtadze, 1984 ).

Unregulated surface water from the roadway also has a significant impact on the development of landslides, draining into the landslide body and increasing the moisture content of the rocks. In addition, they contribute to the further activation of erosion processes.

It should also be noted the impact of seismic activity. The study area is part of the southern Caucasus fold system and is included in the 8-point zone according to the seismic zoning of Georgia. 5 - 6-point earthquakes are not uncommon here ( Seismic-Resistant Construction, 2009 ).

In the study area we have selected, 9 landslide areas are distinguished, which are characterized by relatively higher activity and pose a real threat. These landslides, as mentioned above, are associated with erosional intrusions and their development significantly determines the activity of these landslides, since the deepening of these processes increases the slope steepness, which contributes to the weakening of the stability of the slopes.

Due to the limited scope of the article, it was not possible to provide a detailed description of the nine districts, so two of them were selected, which are typical and contain a large number of common characteristics. These are landslide #4 and landslide #7.

Area #4 is developed in the bed of an eroded ravine and includes both of its slopes, the tongue of which reaches the banks of the reservoir, shown in Figures 3-8 .

Natural and artificial slopes can become unstable. Slope stability analysis is a static or dynamic, analytical or numerical method for assessing slope stability and understanding the causes of a slope failure or the factors that trigger a slope movement. The ratio between shear strength and shear stress expressed as a safety factor defines the slope stability ( Rotaru et al., 2022 ; Fredlund, 1984 ; Mansour, 2011 ).

In this regard, samples of the undisturbed structure of the cover rocks were taken. Their physical properties were determined. Their mechanical characteristics were selected based on normative documents. Based on the existing topographic maps and field survey drawings, the estimated landslide creep plane was determined and a schematic section was constructed, on which the slope stability characteristic K coefficient was calculated ( Figure 9 , Table 1 ), considering various natural factors (seismic events and rock moisture) ( Lomtadze, 1977 ; Lapiashvili, 2013 ; Abbaspour et al., 2018 ; Zhang et al., 2022 ). Below are the results of the calculations.

Similar studies were conducted at landslide site #7, shown in Figures 10-15 and Table 2 .

Below is Table 3 , which clearly shows the impact that increasing two main factors—rock moisture and seismic shocks.