Seismic performance of the St. George of the Latins church : lessons learned from studying masonry ruins

Abstract

This work addresses the seismic safety of the remainings of one church in Famagusta (Cyprus), including also a historical survey, inspection and diagnosis. The seismic safety is studied in detail, using limit analysis of collapse mechanisms as preliminary safety assessment. Then, a finite element model was prepared and updated using dynamic identification results. The updated model was subjected to non-linear static (pushover) analysis in different directions (global and principal) using two lateral load patterns: proportional to the mass and proportional to the modal shapes of the structure. Finally, a time history analysis is also performed. The results allow to conclude that: (a) limit analysis of collapse mechanism can be adequately employed for the seismic assessment of masonry ruins, as they provide comparable results to more sophisticated analysis; (b) load patterns proportional to the mode shapes in pushover analysis of complex masonry structures should be carefully considered, as they can provide too conservative results; (c) the ruins of the church exhibit a low seismic safety.This work was partly funded by project FP7-ENV-2009-1-244123-NIKER of the 7th Framework Programme of the European Commission Project