CHAPTER-3

Earthquake Loading and

Earthquake Resistant
Structures
 What is an Earthquake?
 Movements within the Earth’s crust cause stress
to build up at points of weakness, and rocks to
deform.
 Stored energy builds up in the same way as
energy builds up in the spring of a watch when it
is wound.
 When the stress finally exceeds the strength of
the rock, the rock fractures along a fault, often at
a zone of existing weakness within the rock. The
stored energy is suddenly released as an
earthquake.
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 Earthquakes are essentially vibrations of the earth’s crust
 Two distinct mechanisms cause earthquakes:
Volcanic eruption
Tectonic movements of the earth’s crust.
 Tectonic movements; are the major causes of observed
earthquakes. They are disturbances resulting from a
rupture or a sudden movement along an existing fault in
the earth’s crust.
 Major earthquakes occur most frequently in particular
areas of the earth’s surface that are called zones of high
probability. However, it is theoretically possible to have
a major earthquake anywhere on the earth at some time.
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 During an earthquake the ground surface moves in all
directions.
 The most damaging effects on structures are generally the
movements in a direction parallel to the ground surface
(that is, horizontally) because of the fact that structures
are routinely designed for vertical gravity loads.
 There is a great uncertainty in the amplitude, duration,
and frequency content of the motions that may be
expected at a particular site.
 Major earthquakes are usually rather short in duration,
often lasting only a few seconds
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Movement of body waves away from the focus of the earthquake. The
epicenter is the location on the surface directly above the earthquake's focus.
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Body waves
Behavior of a building during an earthquake
 Behavior of a building during an earthquake
Earthquake of June 16, 1964 in Niigata, Japan had a magnitude
of 7.4. Liquefaction of some soils in the area caused large
apartment buildings to tip over on their sides.
 Cont.…
A view of a parking lot on the campus of California State
University. Columns of reinforced concrete failed after the 1994
Northridge earthquake and its aftershocks.
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The earthquake of March 27, 1964, in the Gulf of Alaska
generated a tsunami. This photo shows a beached fishing boat
that was carried landward by the tsunami wave.
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2011 Japan Earthquake
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2011 Japan Earthquake
 Date 14:46:23, 11 March 2011
 Duration 6 minutes
 Magnitude 9.0
 Depth 32 km
 Type Megathrust earthquake
 Countries or regions affected Japan (primary); Pacific Rim (tsunami, secondary)
 Total damage Tsunami wave, flooding, landslides, fires, building and
infrastructure damage, nuclear incidents including radiation releases
 Peak ground acceleration 2.99 g
 Tsunami: 37.9 meters
 Casualties 12,787 deaths; 4,661 injured; 14,991 people missing
 over 125,000 buildings damaged or destroyed. The earthquake and tsunami
caused extensive and severe structural damage in Japan, including heavy
damage to roads and railways as well as fires in many areas, Landslides and a
dam collapse.
 MEASUREMENT OF EARTHQUAKES
• Modern recording equipment and practices provide us
with representations of the ground movements at various
locations
• There are two terms used to define the measurement of
earthquakes:
Magnitude: refers to a measure of its size in terms of
energy released and radiated in the form of seismic
waves.
Intensity: is the term intended to denote the potential
destruction of an earthquake at a particular location. It
depends on focal depth, epicenter distance, local geology
and structural characteristics in addition to the magnitude
of earthquake.
 Cont.…
 The strength of an earthquake can be measured by a
device called a seismograph.
 When an earthquake occurs this device converts the
wave energy into a standard unit of measurement like
the Richter scale.
 In the Richter scale, units of measurement are
referred to as magnitudes.
 The Richter scale is logarithmic.
 Thus, each unit increase in magnitude represents 10
times more energy released.
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• The following equation can be used to
approximate the amount of energy released
from an earthquake in joules when Richter
magnitude (M) is known:
Energy in joules = 1.74 x 10(5 + 1.44*M)
DESIGN OF EARTHQUAKE RESISTANT STRUCTURES

A structure should be able to:

– Resist earthquakes of minor intensity with out
damage
– Resist moderate earthquakes with minor structural
and some non-structural damages
– Resist major catastrophic earthquakes with out
collapse
 Seismic Load Resistive Structural Systems
The various elements of structural systems of buildings,
which serve as seismic, load resistive system consists of:
Horizontal diaphragms: consist of elements such as roofs,
floor framing and/or the deck system having sufficient
strength and stiffness with rigid and useful planes.
Open rigid frames: consist of beams and columns framed
together to produce moment resisting system and are the most
flexible of the basic type of lateral resistive system.
Braced frames: refers to the use of trussing or triangulation
of the frame to achieve its lateral stability. The trussing causes
the lateral loads to induce only axial forces in the members of
the frame as compared to the behavior of rigid frame.
Vertical diaphragms: shear walls are walls of buildings and
essentially function as lateral load resistive system, Most
common type includes: concrete masonry, wood shear walls,
RC shear walls.
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Lateral-force-resisting systems:
(a) steel moment-resisting frame;
(b) reinforced concrete moment-resisting frame;
(c) braced steel frame;
(d) reinforced concrete shear walls;
(e)steel frame building with cast-in-place concrete shear walls;
(f) steel frame building with in-filled walls of no reinforced masonry.
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RESPONSE OF STRUCTURES TO EARTHQUAKE MOTIONS
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