Seminar on Seismic Risk Assessment of Buildings in Pakistan (Case Study

Abbottabad City)
Dr. Khan Shahzada, Associate Professor , Department of Civil Engineering, University of
Engineering and Technology (UET), Peshawar Presented a seminar in COMSATS
Abbottabad on Seismic Risk Assessment of Buildings in Pakistan (Case Study
Abbottabad City).
This research aims at finding the seismic risk assessment of existing buildings in Pakistan
(case study Abbottabad City). The seismic risk assessment study of buildings in the City
consists of Hazard Assessment and Vulnerability Assessment of buildings. The research
work was divided into two phases, i-e Field work and Laboratory work, for both the
Hazard assessment and Vulnerability assessment of the City.
Standard Penetration Test (SPT) and Multi Channel Analysis of Surface Waves (MASW)
tests were performed at different locations in Abbottabad City to investigate the shear
wave velocity distribution of seismic waves in the subsurface soil. Hazard maps for
different zones of Abbottabad City have been developed. The hazard maps show that
Mandian zone has the highest peak ground acceleration followed by Kakul and Supply
zone. The peak ground acceleration at Nawansher zone is minimum.
In order to determine the vulnerability assessment of buildings at Abbottabad City, 620
independent buildings were surveyed having 680 blocks. From the inventory data it was
found that the building stock at Abbottabad City comprised of 73% unreinforced masonry
buildings and, 20% Reinforced concrete buildings whereas the remaining 7% buildings
are confined brick masonry buildings.
To evaluate the seismic capacity of unreinforced masonry buildings and confined brick
masonry buildings in the City, a typical URBM building was selected, fabricated and
tested under gradually increased cyclic load. Similarly for the CBM buildings a
representative model of these buildings at Abbottabad was fabricated and tested on shake
table to estimate its seismic capacity. Pushover curves of these buildings were developed.
To evaluate the seismic capacity of RC buildings at Abbottabad City a two story RC
model buildings was fabricated and tested on the shake table.
In order to generate the fragility curves for the building stock at Abbottabad City,
Advanced Capacity Spectrum Method (ACSM) was used (Bora 2007). The pushover
curves were converted to Capacity curves of these buildings and were used in the fragility
curves development.
The risk assessment study of the buildings at Abbottabad city was made by using the
fragility curves developed by using the ACSM approach and the Hazard maps developed
through NISRAF. The seismic risk has been investigated directly from the fragility curves
as well as by using the Mid-America Earthquake Center Seismic Loss Assessment
System (MAEviz 2007). It was concluded that since the peak ground acceleration at
Mandian zone is 0.39g, and seismic risk to buildings of various categories is maximum
followed by Kakul/Supply with peak ground acceleration 0.285g, Main City 0.26g.
Similarly, the seismic risk to buildings of various categories at Nawansher zone is
minimum with peak ground acceleration of 0.114g.