Date of Award

December 2019

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Civil Engineering

Committee Member

Weichiang Pang

Committee Member

Brandon Ross

Committee Member

Thomas E Cousins

Committee Member

Mohammad B Javanbarg

Abstract

The entire study can be divided into four main studies. Study I presents the development of probabilistic version of popular Kingery and Bulmash (KB) blast model. The probabilistic model was developed by considering the uncertainty in the model quantified using available experimental data. The model was then applied to generate fragility curves are developed for three types of glazing under three common bombing scenarios and study 1995 Oklahoma City damage.

Study II discusses on development a blast loss estimation framework for buildings where demand loads are calculated using the probabilistic blast model and capacity form seismic design. Loss for archetypes buildings designed with three levels of seismic design category were estimated using the loss estimation framework. The objective was to see if there is potential benefit in terms of monetary value for three design categories. The results showed that as design level increased from ordinary, intermediate to special moment frame the blast performance was improved for some blast scenarios.

In Study III concept of protection zones is presented which are zones in building with varying level of security, has been introduced based on the principle - as security increases the probable size of bomb should decrease. Probable bombs are uniformly placed at each protection zone to create many possible scenarios of terrorism event. The Brussels’ Airport attack of 2016 is studied using this framework and loss values are obtained to understand the associated risk. The results showed that the actual attack could have been worse. Strategies for improving security are employed in protection zones and its influence on threat reduction is studied.

Study IV is about development of a probabilistic injury model to estimate the consequence of blast injuries to people. The blast parameters (pressure and impulse) are calculated using Kingery and Bulmash blast model. Monte Carlo simulation is used to randomly distribute people on each floor and estimate injury states for each blast scenario due to primary and secondary effects blast. An agent-based model (ABM) was developed to track movement of people in case of multiple blast scenario. The model was used to study three case studies – Brussels’ Airport bombing, Manchester Arena’s Bombing and Oklahoma City Bombing.

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