Damage Assessment of a Romanian Historical Masonry Building under Near-Field Earthquake

In the present research work, the effect of ground motion vertical components in case of near-field excitations has been analysed. To this aim, the Banloc Castle, a historical masonry building located in the Region of Banloc in Romania has been examined. A FEM model of the building has been setup using DIANA FEA analysis software and investigated in the non-linear dynamic field. The ground motion components have been characterised by the Vertical (V) /Horizontal (H) acceleration ratios. In order to estimate the influence of the vertical seismic motion in terms of both displacements and stress regime, the seismic records have been referred to the Banloc site, located 7.01 km far from the epicentre with a moment magnitude Mw=5.5 and a focal depth of 9 km. The results have shown that the vertical ground motion sensibly modifies the structural behaviour of the inspected building, since it produces a modification of induced stress regime of the examined case study. Finally, numerical damage patterns have been plotted aiming at simulating the real cracks detected in the case study after the considered seismic event.