The stability of jointed rock slope is mainly controlled by the shear strength and distribution of joints. The failure of jointed rock slopes usually has large deformation and discontinuous features; therefore

discrete element method becomes an efficient way for stability analysis of jointed rock slopes. A general study of the intact rock properties and mechanical characteristics of joints are carried out using the particle flow code in two dimensions (PFC2D); and a heavily jointed rock slope is modeled using PFC2D to study the slope stability. The results reveal that the failure of jointed rock slopes is a gradual process; the joint connectivity has large effect on the stability of rock slopes with heavily joints; when the joint connectivity is more higher

the slope is more unstable; with the decrease of joint connectivity

the slope failure modes will change from the large scale slide into a partially collapsed form