A Structural Health Monitoring System for a Damaged Classroom Building Displayed in the 921 Earthquake Museum of Taiwan
Licensed according to this deed.
Category
Published on
Abstract
A Structural Health Monitoring System for a Damaged Classroom Building Displayed in the 921 Earthquake Museum of Taiwan
This study develops a structural health monitoring (SHM) system for evaluating the safety of a damaged classroom building in the 921 Earthquake Museum of Taiwan (921EMT). The monitored structure is a 1-story building that was previously a classroom in Kuang-Fu Midde School and was damaged in the Chi-Chi earthquake on September 21, 1999. The classroom was subsequently strengthened with acrylic glass walls and has been on display at the 921EMT since 2007. Because visitors are permitted to walk inside the building, a long-term SHM system was developed to provide safety warnings for this building. The hardware system including sensor array and a central data recording and processing module was first installed at the end of 2010. In this study, the dynamic responses of the structure caused by earthquakes and ambient vibrations are collected and a system identification technique is employed to extract the dynamic properties of the building. A numerical model of the building is established and modified based on the obtained data. A procedure for detecting real-time damage and assessing post-earthquake damage is also developed. This procedure is then verified with the developed numerical model and various damage scenarios. The procedure has been coded as software and tested using later earthquake events. The results of this study could provide a reliable SHM algorithm for the building.