Protection of mediterranean historical structures against earthquakes using fragility curves

Abstract eng:
The post-earthquake rehabilitation and retrofitting of historical structures is an important issue in the entire Mediterranean area, where many cultural heritage buildings are made of masonry. This type of structure is characterized by its low tensile strength, geometrical peculiarities, past damages due to earthquakes, degradation (cracks), lack of proper conservation and sometimes incompatible human interventions. The high importance of these structures and the high seismicity of their location are two contradictory factors that impose their present state’s evaluation and if necessary, the definition of possible strengthening measures, minimization of interventions, as well as the compatibility of the materials used in rehabilitation of historical structures, are highly desirable. In this paper, a methodology developed for the protection of historical masonry structures is presented and illustrated on three characteristic examples of historical outstanding masonry structures, located in the island of Creta, Greece, will be presented. For the analytical assessment of historical structures’ seismic response, two sets of information should be taken into consideration. The first one involves structural properties and the other one the parameters characterizing the random seismic event. In both cases, many uncertainties are introduced during the structural and earthquake simulation. The buildings’ seismic response will be investigated through finite element analysis and presentation of their vulnerability assessment in probabilistic terms, using the software SAP v.11.0.1 and the program FAILURE, which provides an optical indication of failing areas on wall surfaces, when the structure is subjected to a single seismic event. By processing the data from the previous software, and particularly the percentage of the total surface’s damage, the fragility curves can easily be formulated. Through these curves, as shown on the examples presented, it is possible to distinguish the possibility of exceeding certain damage levels and also to investigate the way that each factor affects the vulnerability of the structure, relatively to others, so that the correlation of the earthquake intensity will be showed.

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