The fragility of buried electrical cables is often neglected in earthquakes but significant damage to cables was observed during the 2010–2011 Canterbury earthquake sequence in New Zealand. This study estimates Poisson repair rates, similar to those in existence for pipelines, using damage data retrieved from part of the electric power distribution network in the city of Christchurch. The funct...

Understanding and assessing the spatial extent of liquefaction hazard requires the spatial dependence of geotechnical properties to be taken into account. In this work, novel multiscale random field models will be developed to characterize and quantify spatial variability of geotechnical parameters across scales. Such models will then be integrated with a simplified procedure for the probabilis...

Liquefaction has occurred during most earthquakes, Niigata 1964, Tangshan 1976, Loma Prieta 1985, Kobe 1995, Chi-Chi Taiwan 1999, Turkey 1999, Haiti 2010, Mexicali 2010 and others. The performance of structures during the Niigata earthquake (1964) in Japan and the nature of damage suffered by them clearly brought out the fact that soil and soil foundation interaction play a significant role in ...

An empirical, energy-based methodology for liquefaction hazard assessment and microzonation mapping is presented. The approach is probabilistic, considers the uncertainty in the liquefaction criterion, and is applicable to most earthquake-induced liquefaction analyses. The examples illustrated are for water-saturated sands at level ground. The energy of ground shaking is estimated from the Four...

Paul C. Rizzo Associates, Inc. (RIZZO) has developed efficient computational tools to evaluate the liquefaction potential of earth embankment dams located within high risk seismic regions. Two relevant case histories are the Saluda Dam and the Santee Cooper East Dam Extension, both structures susceptible to liquefaction, and located in South Carolina. Saluda Dam presents liquefaction risks with...