Tsunami waves have relatively small wave heights (typically 0.5-2m), but
very long wavelengths offshore. As they approach the shoreline and
enter shallower waters, their wavelength reduces and their wave heights
increase dramatically. The resulting waves can cause violent impacts on
infrastructure and buildings, and the long wavelengths lead to extensive
inundation inland causing destruction over large areas of coast as seen
recently in Japan (2011). Yet it is still unclear how to assess forces
on buildings and coastal defences from tsunami and assess their effects.
This paper presents an overview of the work carried out to date at UCL
EPICentre to systematically analyse the physics of tsunami flows in and
around buildings, the forces and pressures they produce on structures
and the assessment of buildings for these actions. New formulations for
tsunami loads on buildings and coastal defences are presented that draw
upon empirical observations from the Japan (2011) tsunami, numerical
analyses and small scale experiments designed to study tsunami-like
flows on building-like structures, and a set of unique large scale
experiment observations of tsunami inundation flows interacting with
coastal defences, single and multiple buildings on rigid bases or
sediment beaches. The latter experiments are carried out at a
world-leading facility for the simulation of tsunami-like waves at HR
Wallingford (UK). The findings of preliminary investigations into
structural analysis approaches for determining the performance of
buildings under tsunami loads are also presented, together with an
initial framework for simplified structural analysis suitable for the
derivation of tsunami fragility functions.
Tiziana Rossetto is a
Professor in Earthquake Engineering in the Department of Civil,
Environmental and Geomatic Engineering (CEGE) at UCL where she directs
the Earthquake and People Interaction Centre (EPICentre,www.ucl.ac.uk/epicentre
). EPICentre, founded in 2007 with seed funding from an EPSRC
Challenging Engineering grant, is now the largest earthquake and tsunami
risk research centre in the UK, with 13 academics, 30 research
staff/PhD students and an MSc programme in Earthquake Engineering with
Disaster Management. Tiziana is acknowledged as an expert in the
assessment of the seismic vulnerability of buildings and is a leader in
the field of tsunami engineering, as proven by her award of a European
Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant. She has also worked in
collaboration with Psychologists on earthquake risk representations in
lay-people and the implications for risk reduction programmes. She has
participated in 8 post-earthquake reconnaissance missions with the UK
Earthquake Engineering Field Investigation Team (Institution of
Structural Engineers). She is a Fellow of the UK Institution of Civil
Engineers (ICE), Chair of the Society of Earthquake and Civil
Engineering Dynamics (SECED, ICE) and sits on the British Standards
Institute Committee for the application of the European Seismic Code
(EC8).
Event Sponsor:John A. Blume Earthquake Engineering Center, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Department of
Contact Email:racquelh@stanford.edu
Contact Phone:3-4150
