Applications of Statistics and Probability in Civil Engineering, Der Kiureghian, Madanat & Pestana (eds)

2003 Millpress, Rotterdam, ISBN 90 5966 004 8

Seismic fragility assessment based on Bayesian updating

T. Osaki & T. Takada
Department of Architecture, the University of Tokyo, Japan

Keywords: seismic fragility, Bayesian updating, Is index

ABSTRACT: This paper deals with development of seismic fragility curves of buildings associated with
seismic performance index (Is) based on Bayesian updating theory. Several buildings empirical fragility
curves based on damage data in the Hyogo-ken Nambu earthquake in 1995 have been established. But estimated fragility curves are too approximate to apply to a particular building, because they have been constructed from various types of building data, from simulated spatial distribution of ground motion intensity.
For more accurate estimation of a building, more detailed information of building such as the result of seismic
diagnosis has to be reflected to the fragility estimation. These precise information will be fully utilized in the
fragility estimation, based on Bayesian updating theory.

INTRODUCTION

Seismic fragility of buildings can be expressed in

terms of fragility curves which describe the conditional limit state probability under the specified
earthquake ground motion intensity. Building fragility curves in Japan have been estimated by several
researchers using the large amount of building damage data gathered in the 1995 Hyogo-ken Nambu
earthquake in Japan (Murao, 2000; Hayashi, 2000).
The fragility curves thus constructed have large
variation, say, 0.6 in a standard deviation of lognormal distribution, since the used data include wide
range of soil conditions, structural types, estimation
error of ground motion intensity, the way of describing ground motion intensity and so on. Although
these fragility curves can be easily used for the fragility estimation of a group of buildings subjected to
different levels of the ground motion intensity, they
may not be adequate for the fragility estimation of a
particular building from which more information
can be taken through design documents, the results
of seismic diagnosis, in-site test and so on.
Buildings built before 1981 when the new seismic design code was put into practice must be
checked to see whether or not they meet the new
code in Japan according to the guideline of seismic
diagnosis.
Hayashi (2000) has recently proposed that these
results of seismic diagnosis are to be reflected in the
building fragility evaluation. His idea is that a fragil-

ity curves are classified into several groups based on

the Is value. However, the fragility curves have been
constructed with subjective engineering judgment,
and have no clear evidence. It then leads to needs of
more rational treatment of new information to subjectively selected results.
The Bayesian updating technique can be effectively utilized to this kind of problem. Once the detailed information of buildings, such as structural
types, predicted ground motion intensity and the Is
values can be obtained, the empirical fragility curves
can be elegantly updated with the Bayesian theory.
Thus, the present paper applies this technique to the
building fragility estimation with information of
newly investigated buildings.
2

EMPIRICAL FRAGILITY ASSESSMENT

2.1 Empirical fragility

More than hundred thousand buildings were severely damaged and hundred and fifty thousand
buildings were moderately damaged in the Hyogoken Nambu earthquake on January 17, 1995. A large
amount of damage data were gathered by Architectural Institute of Japan (AIJ), Kobe City and others.
The seismic fragility can be estimated by utilizing
the damage data and the spatial ground motion distribution was proposed by several studies (Yamaguchi, 1999). The empirical fragility curves have been

185

drawn to same categories of structural types, building vintage and the number of stories, and often
have the following lognormal function, (Murao,
2000)
ln PGV  O
)

Pf ( PGV )

(1)

where )() is the standard normal cumulative distribution function and Oand ] are the mean and standard deviation of the logarithm of building fragility
in terms of the peak ground velocity, respectively.
Oand ] are often determined by the least-square
method.
2.2 Seismic performance index Is
The seismic performance index based on Guideline
for Evaluation of Seismic Capacity of Existing Reinforced Concrete Buildings (1997) in Japan has been
commonly used to judge whether seismic strengthening is necessary or not for future strong motions.
The second performance index Is is expressed as in
the following
Is

E0 SDT

(2)

where E0 is a basic structural index and is given by

E0

CF

(3)

C is an index describing the story lateral strength,

estimated by the ultimate shear capacity in terms of
a story shear coefficient, and F is an index associated with the story ductility, estimated by ultimate
deformation capacity normalized by the story drift
of 1/250 when a standard size column is assumed to
fail in shear. For most ductile columns, F is assumed
3.2, and for a short and extremely brittle column F
becomes 0.8. SD in Eq.(2) is a modification factor,
related to the stiffness discontinuity along height,
eccentric distribution of stiffness in planes, irregularity of framing and so on, ranging from about 0.5
to 1.2. T is a reduction factor, reflecting the grade of
deterioration, ranging from about 0.5 to 1.0.
If the second seismic performance index Is which
represents energy dissipation capacity till the story
shear collapse is far less than 0.6, the building would
be judged to need to be strengthened to achieve Is
greater than 0.6. This critical value 0.6 is empirically
determined based on the intensive studies on building damage in the past big earthquakes in Japan.
Building designed according to the current seismic
design code (after 1981) are considered to possess Is
value more than 0.6.

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2.3 Damage state level

AIJ (1997) has investigated damage of RC buildings
in the 1995 Hyogo-ken Nambu earthquake and classified damage state into 5 levels. They are shown in
the Table 1.
Table 1. Damage state levels defined by AIJ (1997)
Damage State

Contents

Nonstructural damage

Structure has no damage

Slight structural damage

Very little cracks exist

w<0.2mm

Minor structural damage

Little cracks are found

0.2mm<w<1.0mm

Moderate structural damage

Large cracks are found

1mm<w<2mm

Severe structural damage

w>2mm
Reinforcements are exposed.
Some parts of RC-structure
is collapsed

Collapse

Structure is collapsed
w=crack width

2.4 RC buildings fragility based on Is

The fragility function Pf of a PGV value which is
proposed by Hayashi is associated with the second
seismic performance index Is in the following form
similar to Eq.(1).
ln PGV  ln(T1 Is)
Pf ( PGV , Is | 4) )

T2

(4)

4 (T1 ,T 2 )

(5)

Hayashi (2000) determines these parameters which

are TandT by using the regression analysis to fit
the fragility of RC buildings including all buildings
whose seismic performance indexes are equal to Is.
7he parameterT is the standard deviation of lognormal distribution and the parameter T is related to
a buildings resistance in 50% probability of failure.
In his study, T is assumed to be constant (=0.6) and
by utilizing Is distribution (Hori, 1997) constructed
by using a few number of RC building damage, the
parameter Tis estimated by regression analysis.
There are, however, not enough supportive reasons
to set the constant T (=0.6) and this assumption
seems to be somewhat subjective. These parameters
should be determined on the basis of the available
damage data. The parameters of Hayashis equation
will be updated with the Bayesian theory in the following.

Osaki, T. & Takada, T.

This information is shown in Table 2 (Yamaguchi, 1999; Kabeyasawa, 1997) and building location,
Estimated PGV distribution and epicenter of the
earthquake are shown in Figure 1.

BAYESIAN UPDATING THEORY

The aim of this study is to update the empirical fragility proposed by Hayashi with utilizing the detailed data collected by Kabeyasawa et al (1997).
The Bayesian theorem is fully used with the following well known from
f (4) v cL(4) p(4)

Table 2. List of damage data corresponding to PGV

Site
:
:
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
:
:

(6)

c L(4) p(4)d 4

1

(7)

in which 4 is the vector of parameters to be estimated, p(4)is the prior distribution representing our
knowledge about 4 before making observations,
L(4) is the likelihood function representing the information contained in the set of observations, c is a
normalizing factor, and f(4) is the posterior distribu
tion representing our updated state of knowledge
about 4. The prior may incorporate any subjective
information about 4 that is based on our engineering
experience and intuition (Der Kiureghian, 2000).
This study deals with the available detailed data
as new information.

41 - 80
81 - 120
121 - 160
161 - 200
201 - 240
241 - 280
!(

^_

Location
Epicenter

!(
(! !(
!( !(

Damage state
:
:
No damage
Severe damage
Collapse
Moderate damage
Collapse
Moderate damage
Moderate damage
Slight damage
Minor damage
:
:

A Prior distribution p(4) is assumed local uniformed distribution as follows

p(4) const 0 d T1 d 1000 0 d T2 d 1

Estimation of ground motion intensity at particular

area in the 1995 Hyogo-ken Nambu earthquake and
detailed buildings information such as structural Is,
damage state, building site can be combined together. Most parts of the investigated buildings are
three or four story public schools.

0 - 40

Is
:
:
1.49
0.46
0.3
0.45
0.59
0.57
0.64
0.71
0.55
:
:

3.2 Prior distribution

3.1 The detailed damage data in the 1995 Hyogoken Nambu earthquake

PGV (Kine)

PGV
:
:
83
84
84
87
96
98
105
57
77
:
:

(8)

The range of 4is determined referring to several researches on RC seismic fragility curves.(Murao,
2000; Hayashi, 2000)

!(
(!!(

!(

!(
!(

!(
!( !( !(

(!!(

!(

(!!(!( !(
!(

!(

!(

!(

12

16
km

^_
Figure 1. Building location and estimated PGV distribution

Seismic fragility assessment based on Bayesian updating

187

3.3 Likelihood function

The Likelihood function takes the following form.

(Kiureghian, 2000; Shinozuka, 1998)

On the basis of Bayesian updating theory, a method

of fragility assessment associated with seismic performance index Is was proposed in this study.
Bayesian theory can synthesize subjective and available objective information, as a result of the updating, well-balanced fragility curves are constructed.
To construct more detailed fragility curves which
reflect individual buildings both analytical and empirical fragility curves will be synthesized by utilizing the Bayesian updating theory, as a next step.

L(T1 ,T 2 )

ln PGVi  ln T1 Isi

T2

ln PGVi  ln T1 Isi
1  )
T2

)
i

(9)

where the first product in the right hand side is for

all buildings that failed in a damage state which are
severer than the particular damage state and the second product is for all buildings that did not fail in
the particular damage and in the severer damage.
3.4 Point estimates of fragility
One option for the fragility estimation is to use point
estimates of parameters 4(Kiureghian, 2000; Shinozuka, 1998)This study adopts maximum likelihood estimate 4 of the posterior distribution. 

) ) ln PGV  ln(T1 Is)

Pf ( PGV , Is | 4

T2

CONCLUSIONS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The prediction of strong ground motion and the RC
structural damage survey data used in this paper
were provided by Dr. Naoya Yamaguchi et al at the
University of Tokyo and Prof. Toshimi Kabeyasawa
at the University of Tokyo. The authors would like
to acknowledge their technical support.
1000

(10)

900
800

Proposed
Hayashi

700

The two parameters T , T (the median and the

lognormal standard deviation of the fragility) are
computed in order to maximize ln L(T ,T ) or ln f (T ,T ) ,
which satisfies the following conditions:

600

500

400
300

w ln f (T1 ,T2 )
wT1

w ln f (T1 ,T2 )
wT2

(11)

200
100
0
0

This computation is performed numerically using a

standard optimization algorithm.

Figure 2 shows the contours of the posterior distribution in the collapse damage state. Table 3 shows
the statistics of the fragility parameters proposed by
this study based on the Bayesian updating along
with Hayashis results. Figures 3 to 7 are comparison of two fragility curves in each damage state:
based on proposed by this study and proposed by
Hayashi. It is found that each of the fragility curves
proposed by this study is evaluated more conservative than Hayashis fragility curves and T which are
the standard deviations of lognormal distribution
proposed by this study are smaller than T proposed
by Hayashi.

0.4

0.6

0.8

Figure 2. Posterior distribution and parameters proposed by

this study and Hayashi
1
0.9 Is=0.2
Is=0.6

0.8

Dam age probability

3.5 Results

0.2

0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
Proposed
Hayashi

0.1
0
0

50

100
PGV(kine)

150

200

Figure 3. Fragility of slight structural damage

188

Osaki, T. & Takada, T.

0.9

0.9

Dam age probability

0.8
Dam age probability

Proposed
Hayashi

Is=0.2

0.8

0.7
0.6
Is=0.2

0.5

Is=0.6

0.4

0.7
0.6
0.5

0.4
0.3

0.2

0.3

Is=0.6
0.1

0.2

0
0

Proposed
Hayashi

0.1
0
0

50

100
PGV(kine)

150

200

Proposed
Hayashi

0.8
Dam age probability

150

200

Figure 7. Fragility of collapse

Slight damage
Minor damage
Moderate damage
Severe damage
Collapse

Proposed
1
2
75.0
0.5
190.0
0.6
250.0
0.3
300.0
0.3
540.0
0.5

Hayashi et. al
1
2
125.0
0.6
250.0
0.6
375.0
0.6
500.0
0.6
625.0
0.6

0.7
Is=0.2

0.6

REFERENCES

0.5
Is=0.6

0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
0

50

100
PGV(kine)

150

200

Figure 5. Fragility of moderate structural damage

1
Proposed
Hayashi

0.9
0.8
Dam age probability

100
PGV(kine)

Table 3. Comparison fragility parameters proposed by this

study with those proposed by Hayashi et al

Figure 4. Fragility of minor structural damage

0.9

50

0.7
Is=0.2

0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1

Is=0.6

0
0

50

100
PGV(kine)

150

Figure 6. Fragility of severe structural damage

200

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Sasani, M. Der Kiureghian A. & Bertero. V 2002. Seismic fragility of short period reinforced concrete structural walls
under-source ground motions, Structural Safety 24 123-138,
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