S. Tanvir Wasti – författare

This book will appeal to specialist engineers with enquiring minds and, in a broader sense, to all who live in buildings, especially those in a seismically active region. While the continual development of building codes permits the design of new construction to resist earthquake loads more effectively, a major problem is that buildings which may once have conformed to past seismic codes become structurally unacceptable according to today's codes and need upgrading or 'retrofitting'. Poor construction methods also result in buildings that do not conform to any codes. Existing 'vulnerable' buildings that require strengthening in earthquake-prone countries immensely outnumber all recent construction.

This text aims to appeal to specialist engineers with enquiring minds and, in a broader sense, to all who live in buildings, especially those in a seismically active region. While the continual development of building codes permits the design of new construction to resist earthquake loads more effectively, a major problem is that buildings which may once have conformed to past seismic codes become structurally unacceptable according to today's codes and need upgrading or "retrofitting". Poor construction methods also result in buildings that do not conform to any codes. Existing vulnerable buildings that require strengthening in earthquake-prone countries immensely outnumber all recent construction. The health of buildings thus requires assessment and rehabilitation. Seismic assessment ranges from the cataloguing of danger symptoms in individual buildings to structural analyses involving finite element procedures and refined statistical analyses incorporating expert systems, stochastic processes and predictions from available databases.Structures have to be rendered fit for earthquakes, and this book shows why and how, offering the results of cutting-edge research in the area and presenting innovative methods that enable system improvement while the structure remains in use. At the turn of the last century, builders pondering the havoc wreaked by earthquakes had scant resources to guide their reconstruction efforts. A century later, earthquakes continue tragic devastations of our cities, with one important difference - today's builders can turn to a rich literature in earthquake engineering to guide their reconstruction efforts. Topics covered in the text include seismic earthquake strong ground motion, dynamic response of structures, seismic assessment of older hazardous construction, and practical seismic rehabilitation methods derived from extensive laboratory and field research. Many of the contributions have been motivated by the tragic consequences, yet real-world experiences, of the 1999 Kocaeli and Duzce earthquakes in Turkey, and demonstrate the rapid progress that can be inspired by necessity.While the topic of this volume is especially important for Turkey and her neighbours, the lessons learned, and clearly presented here, are universal and should be studied by serious earthquake engineers worldwide.

Earthquakes affecting urban areas can lead to catastrophic situations and hazard mitigation requires preparatory measures at all levels. Structural assessment is the diagnosis of the seismic health of buildings. Assessment is the prelude to decisions about rehabilitation or even demolition. The scale of the problem in dense urban settings brings about a need for macro seismic appraisal procedures because large numbers of existing buildings do not conform to the increased requirements of new earthquake codes and specifications or have other deficiencies. It is the vulnerable buildings - liable to cause damage and loss of life - that need immediate attention and urgent appraisal in order to decide if structural rehabilitation and upgrading are feasible. Current economic, efficient and occupant-friendly rehabilitation techniques vary widely and include the application either of precast concrete panels or layers, strips and patches of fiber reinforced polymers (FRP) in strategic locations. The papers in this book, many by renowned authorities in earthquake engineering, chart new and vital directions of research and application in the assessment and rehabilitation of buildings in seismic regions. While several papers discuss the probabilistic prediction and quantification of structural damage, others present approaches related with the in-situ and occupant friendly upgrading of buildings and propose both economical and practical techniques to address the problem.

The Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Study Institute on Analysis and Design of Bridges held at ~e§me, lzmir, Turkey from 28 June 1982 to 9 July 1982 are contained in the present volume. The Advanced Study Institute was attended by 37 lecturers and participants from 10 different countries. The Organizing Committee consisted of Professors P. Gtilkan, A. C. Scordelis, S. T. Wasti and 9. Yl. lmaz. The guidelines set by NATO for the Advanced Study Institute require it to serve not only as an efficient forum for the dissemination of available advanced knowledge to a selected group of qualified people but also as a platform for the exploration of future research possibilities in the scientific or engineering areas concerned. The main topics covered by the present Advanced Study Institute were the mathematical modelling of bridges for better analysis and the scientific assessment of bridge behaviour for the introduction of improved design procedures. It has been our observation that as a result of the range and depth of the lectures presented and the many informal discussions that took place, ideas became fissile, the stimulus never flagged and many gaps in the engineering knowledge of the participants were "bridged". Here we particularly wish to mention that valuable informal presenta­ tions of research work were made during the course of the Institute by Drs. Friedrich, Karaesmen, Lamas and Parker.