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Life Safety Techniques for Earthquake Events—Alternative Approaches to Overall Building Strengthening

A special issue of Applied Sciences (ISSN 2076-3417). This special issue belongs to the section "Civil Engineering".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 October 2022) | Viewed by 2366

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
CERIS, Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon, 1649004 Lisbon, Portugal
Interests: building rehabilitation; seismic strengthening; structural testing; building surveying; masonry walls
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

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Guest Editor
CERIS—Civil Engineering Research and Innovation for Sustainability, Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, 1049-001 Lisboa, Portugal
Interests: seismic protection; base isolation; structural analysis for seismic safety

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Guest Editor
CERIS—Civil Engineering Research and Innovation for Sustainability, Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, 1049-001 Lisboa, Portugal
Interests: seismic rehabilitation; structural testing; numerical modeling

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In most countries with relevant seismicity, a significant part of the building stock does not comply with modern design codes, namely in respect of earthquake strength.

The ideal approach to this structural safety problem would consist of strengthening all vulnerable buildings with a heritage or architectonical interest or even demolishing them and building new ones if none of these values are recognized. However, these approaches are very intrusive and expensive and may not be implemented in due time.

In this context, low-intrusive and low-cost life-safety techniques have been designed and developed to allow protecting buildings’ occupants without requiring buildings to undergo overall structural strengthening.

The main purpose of this Special Issue is to attract world-leading researchers in the area of “Life Safety Techniques for Earthquake Events—Alternative Approaches to Overall Building Strengthening” and to spread their latest developments.

Dr. João Gomes Ferreira
Dr. Luís Guerreiro
Dr. João Guerreiro
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • earthquakes
  • life safety
  • life protection
  • buildings
  • collapse

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

21 pages, 7974 KiB  
Article
The Design of a Structural Hyper-Resisting Element for Life-Threatening Earthquake Risk (SHELTER) for Building Collapse Scenarios: The Safety Chairs
by João Guerreiro, Luís Guerreiro, Seyedsajjad Hosseini, Rita Moura and João Gomes Ferreira
Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(9), 4103; https://doi.org/10.3390/app12094103 - 19 Apr 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1926
Abstract
Project SHELTER, Structural Hyper-resisting Element for Life-Threatening Earthquake Risk, aims at developing a strong and stiff functional unit to protect its occupants in case of severe earthquakes that lead to structural collapse. In case of collapse, these units will suffer impacts, particularly if [...] Read more.
Project SHELTER, Structural Hyper-resisting Element for Life-Threatening Earthquake Risk, aims at developing a strong and stiff functional unit to protect its occupants in case of severe earthquakes that lead to structural collapse. In case of collapse, these units will suffer impacts, particularly if they are installed in upper floors. To avoid severe injuries or death of occupants caused by collapse, safety chairs were designed, provided with shock-absorber systems and auxiliary retaining devices, to keep the occupants properly seated and safe. Three downfall scenarios were evaluated, consisting of vertical and tilted positions. A comprehensive numerical model to represent the human body was developed, mainly focused on chest behaviour and considering the anatomic limits of the vertebral spine. The mechanical ability of the safety chair to ensure the occupants’ safety was evaluated under these harsh conditions. Experimental downfall-and-impact tests will later be performed on shelter units, with crash-test dummies seated on the safety chairs for final validation. Full article
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