Abstract: White sandstone is a common sedimentary rock in tunnel engineering,widely distributed in Southwest China.The low strength and developed joint fissures of white sandstone,coupled with frequent blasting disturbances during construction,pose a serious threat to the construction safety of tunnels in white sandstone.In this study,through the sandstone multi-stage variable upper limit cyclic loading test,mathematical statistics and theoretical analysis,and then reveal the cyclic mechanical properties and energy evolution process of sandstone under different peripheral pressure conditions,put forward a suitable fatigue damage model of white sandstone peripheral rock,and verified the correctness of the model through numerical simulation and on-site application.The results of the study show that:(1)The comparison of the damage photos and sketch diagrams of the rock samples after the test shows that the experimental confining pressure in the test controls the failure mode of the white sandstone rock,and the strength,fatigue deformation,life span,and energy release and dissipation characteristics of the white sandstone are significantly affected by the experimental confining pressure,and there are obvious differences in the anti-fatigue damage capacity of the sandstone under different experimental confining pressure conditions.(2)In the cyclic loading phase,the shape of the stress hysteresis loop and the dissipation of energy of the white sandstone increase with the number of cycles,and the fatigue damage resistance of the sandstone increases with the number of cycles.energy decrease with the increase of the number of cycles,and the white sandstone shows two-phase damage evolution characteristics in each cyclic loading stage; (3)Compared with the cyclic loading,the axial stress increase at the beginning of each cyclic stage is the main controlling factor for the rock failure; (4)Based on the principle of energy dissipation,a fatigue damage model is proposed to reasonably describe the cumulative damage of white sandstone,and it is able to describe the damage accumulation of the excavation of the surrounding rock of white sandstone well,and it is also suitable for the fatigue damage model of white sandstone.The model is especially suitable for drilling and blasting tunnels in white sandstone strata in high stress environment.(5)The application of the model shows that,in the Ⅳ white sandstone surrounding rock section,the tunnel deformation did not change significantly after the blasting excavation footage increasing the design from 3.5m to 4.2m,the stability of the perimeter rock,the construction efficiency is significantly improved.The study provides an important theoretical reference for the efficient and safe construction of drilling and blasting tunnels in white sandstone formation.