Generation of Fragility Curves for Typical RC Health Care Facilities: Emphasis on Hospitals in Turkey

Abstract

This study uses fragility curves to focus on the seismic safety evaluation of RC hospital buildings in Turkey. Three hospital buildings with varying heights of 3–5 stories are selected, and a set of fragility curves are generated for each class. The major parameters considered in this study are the number of stories, lateral stiffness, strength, and displacement capacities of the selected template designs. A large number of pushover and time history analyses are deployed under a set of 100 strong ground motion records. Fragility curves are generated based on the analysis results for each of the typical buildings. Peak ground velocity (PGV) is selected as the measure of seismic intensity. From the generated sets of the fragility curves, it is observed that damage probabilities are significantly affected by the concrete and detailing quality. Using the constructed fragility curves, collapse probabilities of existing public buildings were estimated according to PGV values. The estimated damage by fragility analyses is compared with past studies related to RC buildings in the region. Hence, analytical fragility curves developed in this study can increase the effectiveness of seismic assessment of essential health care facilities with template designs in the Turkey region.