Title: Robustness assessment for progressive collapse of framed structures using pushdown analysis methods

Authors: Da-Gang Lu; Shuang-Shuang Cui; Peng-Yan Song; Zhi-Heng Chen

Addresses: School of Civil Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China. ' School of Civil Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China. ' School of Civil Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China. ' School of Civil Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China

Abstract: The issue of robustness assessment for progressive collapse of structures has been paid much attention to in the community of civil engineering since the 9/11 event. In this paper, both deterministic indices and reliability-based indices are introduced to quantify the robustness of a structure. The conventional deterministic pushdown analysis is improved to take into account the loading scheme for simulating column loss. To consider stochastic system properties, a random pushdown analysis is proposed by an improved point estimation method based on Nataf transformation. By using the developed pushdown methods, the reserve load carrying capacity of the damaged structure is evaluated, the robustness for resisting progressive collapse of the damaged structure is quantitatively assessed and the key element to be removed which is critical to structural global performance is identified. A code-conforming reinforced concrete frame structure is taken as a case study to demonstrate the applicability of the newly developed methods.

Keywords: deterministic indices; robustness indicies; reliability; progressive collapse; pushdown analysis; global reliability; robustness assessment; structural collapse; robust structures; column loss; loading; damaged structures; point estimation; reinforced concrete frames.

DOI: 10.1504/IJRS.2012.044293

International Journal of Reliability and Safety, 2012 Vol.6 No.1/2/3, pp.15 - 37

Received: 02 Jun 2010
Accepted: 25 Mar 2011
Published online: 27 Dec 2014 *

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