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Deterministic earthquake damage and loss assessment for the city of Bucharest, Romania

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Abstract

On March 4, 1977, an earthquake with a moment magnitude M w 7.4 at a hypocentral depth of 94 km hit the Vrancea region (Romania). In Bucharest alone, the earthquake caused severe damage to 33,000 buildings while 1,424 people were killed. Under the umbrella of the SAFER project, the city of Bucharest, being one of the larger European cities at risk, was chosen as a test bed for the estimation of damage and connected losses in case of a future large magnitude earthquake in the Vrancea area. For the conduct of these purely deterministic damage and loss computations, the open-source software SELENA is applied. In order to represent a large event in the Vrancea region, a set of deterministic scenarios were defined by combining ranges of focal parameters, i.e., magnitude, focal depth, and epicentral location. Ground motion values are computed by consideration of different ground motion prediction equations that are believed to represent earthquake attenuation effects in the region. Variations in damage and loss estimates are investigated through considering different sets of building vulnerability curves (provided by HAZUS-MH and various European authors) to characterize the damaging behavior of prevalent building typologies in the city of Bucharest.

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Notes

  1. Even though the improved MADRS method follows the same principles as described in ATC-40, its computation algorithm and application is easier and leads to more stable and plausible estimates of spectral displacements. Many considered the iterative computation procedure of ATC-40 unnecessarily complex and clumsy for the intended use of this procedure (Freeman 2004). In addition, it was reported by many that the ATC-40 method and the coefficient method of FEMA 273 (FEMA 1997) revealed different estimates for displacement demands even structural parameters remained the same. In response to these critiques, ATC proposed to FEMA that a study should be conducted to determine the reasons for differing results and to develop guidance for practicing engineers on improved application of these two methods leading to the improved MADRS procedures summarized into FEMA 440 (ATC 2005). Its main advantage compared to the ATC-40 method may lie in the fact that the engineer is facilitated with a visualization tool that allows a direct graphical comparison between structural capacity and demand. Due to these reasons, MADRS method was favored for the conduct of the present risk computations.

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Acknowledgments

This work has been developed thanks to the funding through the SAFER project, the International Centre for Geohazards ICG, and the Spanish projects REN2001-1674/RIES, REN2003-01975, and MARSH: CGL2007-62454 and GV07/045. The authors would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for valuable comments, which helped to improve the manuscript significantly.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. NORSAR/ICG, Kjeller, Norway

    Dominik Lang & Conrad Lindholm

  2. Faculty of Sciences, University of Alicante, S Vicente del Raspeig, Alicante, Spain

    Sergio Molina-Palacios

  3. National Institute for Earth Physics, Bucharest, Romania

    Stefan Balan

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  1. Dominik Lang
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  2. Sergio Molina-Palacios
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  3. Conrad Lindholm
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  4. Stefan Balan
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Correspondence to Sergio Molina-Palacios.

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Lang, D., Molina-Palacios, S., Lindholm, C. et al. Deterministic earthquake damage and loss assessment for the city of Bucharest, Romania. J Seismol 16, 67–88 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10950-011-9250-y

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