Correlations between structural damage and ground motion parameters during the Ms8.0 Wenchuan Earthquake

The Wenchuan Earthquake with a magnitude of Ms 8.0 struck the Sichuan province of China on May 12, 2008, where it mainly affected the area along the Longmenshan fault. In total, 420 three-component acceleration records were obtained by the China Strong Motion Networks Centre during this seismic event, among which over 50 records exceeded 100 gal. In the present study, we collected 48 near-fault acceleration records to derive strong ground motion parameters in terms of the peak ground acceleration, peak ground velocity, peak spectrum acceleration (5% of the damping ratio) and spectrum intensity (5% of damping ratio). We determined the building collapse ratios (CRs) for 20 targeted districts based on data acquired from both the China Earthquake Administration and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, where the CRs combined the data for all building types. Fragility curves were established between the CRs and the corresponding ground motion parameters, based on which the damage criteria were proposed. In particular, we derived the fragility curves for brick-concrete structures and frame-structures. These curves indicate how different structural types can determine the damage sustained. In addition, we developed a method for estimating building damage classifications. If we assume that buildings are built according to the improved Seismic Fortification Criterion in the revised “Code for Seismic Design of Buildings”, the predicted CRs for the 20 targeted districts would be significantly lower compared with the actual damage they sustained, which illustrates the validity of both the method and the revised code.