Computational Modeling of Urban Building Complexes for Earthquake Early Warning: A Finite Element Approach

Abstract

Urban population is particularly at risk due to the fact that the structural strength of buildings may be also seriously damaged when subjected to an earthquake. The present work is to provide a numerical formulation that achieves the desired outcome of providing an approach to the prediction of structural response of an urban assemblage of high-rise and mid-rise buildings in an earthquake environment. Based on the Finite Element Analysis (FEA) the model assesses the damage and elastic response of building components subjected under different earthquake scenarios using damage indices, stress, strain and displacement. The model involves three earthquake magnitudes, that is, M6.0, M7.5 and M8.0 that would assume the conditions of shallow crustal fault in addition to seduction zone faulting.