Modeling the seismic response of historical masonry buildings is challenging due to many aleatory and epistemic uncertainties. Additionally, the interaction between structural units further complicates predictions of the seismic behavior of unreinforced masonry aggregates found throughout European city centers. This motivated the experimental campaign on half-scale, double-leaf...
Seismic risk assessment of industrial facilities is complex due to the presence of different types of equipment. It represents a research issue that requires further investigation. To this end, some analytical approaches have been developed in the framework of performance-based earthquake engineering. Nonetheless, their accuracy in the case of complex critical facilities, such as...
In this study, the wavefield radiated from a building to its surroundings is identified and extracted from M4.6 earthquake recordings collected by sensors installed in a building and on the nearby athletic field in Matera (Italy) using a new approach for soil-structure interaction assessment. The proposed approach for earthquake data analysis combines in an innovative way two...
On December 29, 2020, nine months after the March Mw 5.4 Zagreb earthquake and amidst the COVID-19 lockdown, a devastating Mw 6.4 earthquake struck near the town of Petrinja, about 50 km SE from the country’s capital Zagreb. It was preceded by the Mw 4.9 foreshock from the day before. The main shock claimed 7 fatalities and caused widespread damage. Historical centers of nearby...
Earthquakes are a major cause of damage and human losses to the built environment, including cultural heritages, monumental buildings and historical centers. In the last decades, the seismic performance of buildings has received special attention due to the interest in the built heritage conservation and protection of human life, particularly with respect to masonry structures...
The paper presents a study on the evaluation of seismic fragility of cylindrical ground-supported steel silos intended for storing solid material. Silos are a key facility in industrial processes. For example, cylindrical steel silos constitute the main structural component for several industrial activities, such as the ones aimed at the production of food and beverage, and...
The paper presents a mechanical-based framework for the evaluation of local-scale seismic fragility curves. The approach is oriented to a seismic vulnerability assessment of unreinforced masonry buildings and makes use of basic exposure data easily obtained from survey or available in existing database. An efficient finite element model and static nonlinear analyses are employed...
Soil plug formation in open-ended piles due to pile driving is a widely studied phenomenon in onshore applications. The narrow diameters of traditional onshore piles ranging from 0.5 to 1.5 m facilitate plug generation during installation and transfer of enhanced confining stresses across the whole body of the soil plug. Offshore wind monopiles with larger diameters and smaller...
A moderate earthquake with a magnitude Mw of 6.8 hit the Elazig Province of Turkey on January 24th, 2020, causing fatalities and structural damage/failure. Following the earthquake, a field reconnaissance was conducted at the Administration and Operation Campus of Karakaya Dam, which is 19 km from the earthquake epicenter. The exhibited performances in two side-by-side nominally...
In this paper, we tackle the problem of the intensity attenuation at Ischia, a critical parameter in a high seismic risk area such as this volcanic island. Starting from the new revised catalogue of local earthquakes, we select a dataset of 118 macroseismic observations related to the four main historical events and analyse the characteristics of the intensity attenuation...
The capabilities of certain standard macro numerical models were evaluated by simulating a shaking table experiment that was performed on a full-scale ten-storey fixed-base building with a frame and dual structural system in two perpendicular directions (denoted as the frame and wall directions) at the largest shaking table in the E-Defense centre in Japan. The lumped plasticity...
Lifelines, such as pipelines, roads, and tunnels, are critical infrastructure and when crossing active tectonic faults, a reliable estimation of the fault displacement in case of an earthquake is required. The first and simplest approach is to use empirical fault scaling relations to compute the design fault displacement, but this may result in an unknown level of safety. Thus...
Remote reconnaissance missions are promising solutions for the assessment of earthquake-induced structural damage and cascading geological hazards. Space-borne remote sensing can complement in-field missions when safety and accessibility concerns limit post-earthquake operations on the ground. However, the implementation of remote sensing techniques in post-disaster missions is...
To predict the response of masonry buildings to various types of loads, engineers use finite element models, specifically solid-element and macro-element models. For predicting masonry responses to seismic events in particular, equivalent frame models—a subcategory of macro-element models—are a common choice because of their low computational cost. However, an existing bottleneck...
The assessment of the seismic behaviour of historic residential buildings and the estimation of their possible losses in the event of an earthquake, is a must for defining strategic mitigation plans to prevent irreplaceable heritage losses. In this study an integrated performance based probabilistic risk assessment methodology is developed. An archival study and a field survey...
Designing a structure to resist earthquakes by targeting an explicit failure risk has been a key research topic over the past two decades. In this article, a risk-targeted design approach is developed for circular reinforced concrete bridge piers, based on a probabilistic optimization procedure aimed at minimising the design resisting moment at the pier base. In order to reduce...
Geotechnical Seismic Isolation (GSI) is an innovative technique for protecting structures in earthquake-prone areas. The main idea is to improve the foundation soil so that seismic energy is partially dissipated within GSI before being transmitted to the structure. Among other materials proposed for foundation soil improvement, gravel-rubber mixtures (GRMs), with rubber grains...
This paper discusses the main results of a full-scale shaking table test campaign carried out under the auspices of the EU funded research project SERA, whose objective is to investigate the seismic performance of three-leaf masonry walls with weak lime-mortar joints. These masonry walls are widely found in seismic prone regions in the Mediterranean area, thus assessing their...
Existing heritage buildings can be especially vulnerable to earthquakes. They were designed only considering gravity loads and some of them are located in earthquake prone areas, such as the southwestern Iberian Peninsula. Besides, there is a high uncertainty in the definition of their constructive parameters and complex geometry. Due to that, it is paramount to develop accurate...