Development of Damage Patterns and Fragility Curves in Brick-nogging Buildings from the Thabeikkyin Earthquake, Myanmar, 2012

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe Thabeikkyin earthquake (moment magnitude scale of 6.8) occurred on November 11, 2012; its epicenter was located 25 km from Thabeikkyin Township, Mandalay Region, Myanmar. Many buildings were damaged severely during the earthquake. In this study, damage patterns of brick-nogging buildings were firstly developed, and damage grades were characterized to allow for easy classification of the damaged buildings. The damaged data of all building types in the surveyed areas were collected by classifying the four damage levels as no damage, slight damage, moderate damage, and heavy damage. To develop the damage patterns of brick-nogging buildings, damage categories were arranged into three damage grades (slight, moderate, and heavy damage). Secondly, a questionnaire survey was conducted to calculate the seismic intensities of the affected areas. Medvedev–Sponheuer–Karnik (MSK) seismic intensities for the surveyed areas were estimated by analyzing the questionnaire survey responses. Finally, fragility curves for brick-nogging buildings were constructed using the estimated seismic intensities from the survey responses combined with the damage levels. These fragility curves may be useful to assess damage to brick-nogging buildings and to predict the number of damaged buildings in future earthquakes.