| NSF Org: |
CMMI Division of Civil, Mechanical, and Manufacturing Innovation |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | December 26, 2017 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | December 26, 2017 |
| Award Number: | 1811084 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Joy Pauschke
jpauschk@nsf.gov (703)292-7024 CMMI Division of Civil, Mechanical, and Manufacturing Innovation ENG Directorate for Engineering |
| Start Date: | January 1, 2018 |
| End Date: | December 31, 2019 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $19,961.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $19,961.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
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| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
1 GRAND AVE BLDG 15 SAN LUIS OBISPO CA US 93407-9000 (805)756-2982 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
One Grand Avenue San Luis Obispo CA US 93407-0830 |
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Performance Congressional District: |
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| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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| Parent UEI: |
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| NSF Program(s): | ECI-Engineering for Civil Infr |
| Primary Program Source: |
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| Program Reference Code(s): |
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| Program Element Code(s): |
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| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.041 |
ABSTRACT
This Grant for Rapid Response Research (RAPID) will support a collaborative team of researchers from five U.S. universities to collect data to document the performance of reinforced concrete buildings during the Puebla-Morelos, Mexico earthquake of September 19, 2017. The ground shaking from this earthquake caused widespread damage to buildings in the epicentral region, as well as in Mexico City (approximately 120 kilometers from the epicenter). In Mexico City, approximately 40 buildings collapsed, and over one thousand structures have been identified with moderate to major structural damage. The 2017 earthquake, having impacted an area that had already been shaken by a strong earthquake in 1985, provides an opportunity to learn about the effectiveness of reinforced concrete building repairs and retrofits made after the 1985 earthquake, as well as an opportunity to study how modern and older, unrepaired reinforced concrete buildings performed during strong ground motion. The majority of collapsed buildings were constructed prior to 1985 before there were major seismic revisions to building codes. There were also a few cases of newer and retrofitted buildings that also sustained damage. Mexico City has soil conditions ranging from stiff rock to very soft soil, producing a diverse set of ground conditions affecting buildings that can facilitate understanding of seismic building performance not only in Mexico, but also in the United States. Because the United States and Mexico have similarities in reinforced concrete building construction, the collected data from this earthquake will contribute to better building design and performance assessment methods, numerical simulation methods, and earthquake intensity indices in both countries, and help foster safer buildings and more earthquake-resilient communities. The collected data will be archived and made publicly available in the NSF-supported Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure, Data Depot and Reconnaissance Integration Portal (http://wwww.DesignSafe-ci.org). Graduate students will participate in the data collection and gain valuable post-earthquake field experience. The project team will disseminate its data collection and research findings through a webinar.
The goal of this RAPID project is to collect perishable data on reinforced concrete building damage that can be used towards understanding and improving seismic performance of buildings and the resilience of communities in the United States. The data collection in Mexico will be conducted in collaboration with researchers and engineers in Mexico and include the following activities: (1) survey buildings built near recording stations with emphasis on retrofitted buildings, buildings that survived the 1985 earthquake, and modern buildings, (2) document damage to non-ductile reinforced concrete buildings for calibration of existing methodologies used to identify vulnerable buildings in the United States, (3) map damage to test commonly assumed correlations with earthquake intensity indices such as peak ground acceleration, peak ground velocity, peak ground displacement, and peak or discrete spectral values of acceleration, velocity and displacement, (4) document the performance of instrumented and base-isolated buildings, (5) deploy accelerometers on damaged and undamaged reinforced concrete buildings with and without retrofits to record ambient vibrations and obtain building dynamic properties, (6) evaluate numerical models of reinforced concrete buildings by subjecting them to ground motion records obtained nearby and compare the numerical estimates and observed performance, and (7) study relationships between building performance and soil conditions.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
On September 19, 2017, an magnitude 7.1 earthquake occurred nearly 75 mi southeast of Mexico City resulting in around 300 deaths and over 40 building collapses. This has been the most damaging earthquake in the region since 1985.The majority of the concrete building stock had previously survived this 1985 earthquake and a number of which had subsequently been retrofitted. The performance of pre-1985, retrofitted, and modern reinforced concrete buildings was of great interest to the NSF RAPID/Collaborative team to understand the vulnerabilities of this building type that would be faced if a large seismic event were to occur in the West Coast of the United States.
The NSF RAPID/Collaborative project allowed undergraduate and graduate students from Cal Poly to participate in field reconnaissance by documenting structural information and damage characteristics (late October 2017) and conducting ambient vibration testing to assess dynamic response of reinforced concrete buildings (late January 2018). Students were mentored by Cal Poly alumni practicing as structural and forensic engineers, in addition to faculty from collaborating institutions – Purdue University, University of Alabama, UC-San Diego, and University of Buffalo. Through these building investigations the research team was exposed to the earthquake impacts on structural performance, while enabling personal interactions with building owners and occupants that provided insight into social effects as well. Collectively data and photographs for over 100 reinforced concrete buildings were gathered. This data has been curated and made publicly available on the NSF sponsored NHERI DesignSafe repository ( https://www.designsafe-ci.org/data/browser/public/designsafe.storage.published/PRJ-2285) for use by other researchers interested in evaluating seismic performance of concrete buildings.
Following the data gathering missions, and with an additional dataset provided by the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) of approximately 2000 buildings, data post-processing and visualization engaged a group of Cal Poly undergraduate students. This team conducted data analysis and visualization, during this process developing and documenting protocols in MATLAB and geo-spatial mapping tool ArcGIS to enable future researchers to rapidly assess post-earthquake structural damage data. This outcome is particularly relevant to enabling emergency modifications to reinforced concrete building codes after future catastrophic earthquakes. Technical findings and progresses in data processing protocols related have been shared via undergraduate authored reports and ArcGIS maps publicly available on the Cal Poly DigitalCommons repository (https://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/arcesp/82/ and https://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/arcesp/102/).
Additionally, the research team has participating in educational outreach by disseminating their experiences with field reconnaissance through online blogs (https://arce.calpoly.edu/mexico-city-reconnaissance and https://arce.calpoly.edu/mexico-city-earthquake-investigation ) and social media; integrating lessons learned into undergraduate coursework related to reinforced concrete design; presenting on-campus at the Cal Poly student chapter of the Structural Engineers Association of California (SEAOC) as well as international conferences. The NSF RAPID/Collaborative project has enabled students to contribute to critical research tasks while providing an unparalleled opportunity to engage in an experience that epitomizes the Cal Poly Learn by Doing teaching philosophy, and to share their lessons learned with a large and diverse audience.
Last Modified: 12/28/2019
Modified by: Anahid Behrouzi
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