The safety of civil engineering structures under external loads, including ground motions, is one of the issues related to the idea of sustainable society. The earthquake-induced soft-storey failure is a typical type of damage observed in buildings due to seismic excitation. The failure of an intermediate soft storey of a structure results in large vertical impact loading acting on the lower floors due to the fall of the upper storeys. The aim of the paper is to show the results of the study focused on the behaviour of columns exposed to such extreme load conditions, including the influence of the degradation of horizontal stiffness of columns on the overall structural response. The results of the study indicate that the stiffness degradation of columns might have a substantial influence on the behaviour of a building leading to the increase in the structural response during ground motion. The results also show that the time of impact is really important indicating that the highest increase in the response can be expected when the impact takes place when the structure is in the range of its peak deformations.
Authors
Additional information
- Category
- Publikacja w czasopiśmie
- Type
- artykuły w czasopismach recenzowanych i innych wydawnictwach ciągłych
- Language
- angielski
- Publication year
- 2013
