Characterising moisture and other properties of civil engineering infrastructure using GPR

Civil engineering infrastructure is often subject to atmospheric influences, flooding events and biological activities from plants and animals. These influences may result in increased water content within the materials used or the formation of internal or adjacent cavities that may threaten the serviceability or even stability of the infrastructure. Construction practices can also lead to the development of such defects in form of cavities. In civil engineering it is often of crucial interest to detect these variations in material properties and the presence of defects. However, as they are often hidden from view, these attributes may be difficult or impossible to target with traditional testing methods. For these reasons rapid geophysical methods, like GPR, are increasingly used.