Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137

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Engineering Structures
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/engstruct

Seismic fragility analysis of low-rise unreinforced masonry structures

Joonam Park a,∗ , Peeranan Towashiraporn b , James I. Craig c , Barry J. Goodno d
a
Korea Railroad Research Institute, Ui-Wang City, Kyung-gi, 437-757, South Korea
b
AIR Worldwide Corporation, Boston, MA 02116, USA
c
School of Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA
d
School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA

article info a b s t r a c t

Article history: Unreinforced masonry (URM) is one of the most common structural types for low-rise buildings in the
Received 4 March 2008 United States. Its dynamic behavior is highly nonlinear, and generally shows high vulnerability to seismic
Received in revised form loading. Despite the need for seismic risk assessment of this class of structures, the fragility curves for
31 July 2008
URM buildings based on analytical models are scarce in the field of earthquake engineering. This study
Accepted 31 July 2008
Available online 7 September 2008
performs seismic fragility analysis of a URM low-rise building. Fragility curves are developed for a two-
story URM building designed to represent a typical essential facility (i.e., a firehouse) in the central and
Keywords:
southern US (CSUS) region. A structural modeling method is proposed such that it can be effectively used
Unreinforced masonry for fragility analysis without significant increase in computational time, and maintains an acceptable
Seismic fragility level of accuracy in representing the nonlinear behavior of the structures. A set of fragility curves are
Out-of-plane wall stiffness developed and include different configurations of the out-of-plane walls and their associated stiffness.
Composite spring model The fragility analysis shows that the seismic performance of URM buildings is well below the desirable
building seismic performance level recommended by current seismic codes, indicating high vulnerability
of URM buildings within the CSUS region. It is also shown that the out-of-plane wall stiffness should not
be ignored in the risk assessment of URM buildings because the overall seismic performance of URM
buildings is rather sensitive to the out-of-plane wall stiffness. The analytical fragility curves developed
are compared with those of HAZUS. The comparison shows that the analytical fragility curves developed
have lower variation in the seismic response than those of HAZUS. Several reasons for the discrepancy are
discussed. The model-based analytical fragility curves developed in this study can increase the accuracy
and effectiveness of seismic risk assessment of essential facilities of the CSUS region. Moreover, the
structural modeling method introduced in this study can be effectively used for development of the
fragility curves of URM buildings.
© 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Unreinforced masonry (URM) is one of the most common
structural types for low-rise buildings in the United States. In
particular, French and Olshansky [1] have showed that nearly
one third of the essential facilities (i.e., firehouses, police stations,
emergency management centers, etc.) distributed within the
central and southern US (CSUS) region are low-rise (i.e., two stories
or less) URM structures. Due to the infrequent nature of major
earthquakes in the CSUS region, however, most existing URM
building structures have been designed considering only gravity
and/or wind loads. Moreover, past earthquake reconnaissance
reports have suggested that unreinforced masonry structures are
highly susceptible to damage from earthquakes. Therefore, URM
∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +82 31 460 5293; fax: +82 31 460 5359.
E-mail address: joonam.park@gmail.com (J. Park).
0141-0296/$ – see front matter © 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.engstruct.2008.07.021
structures have high seismic vulnerability over the CSUS region.
This means that a moderate or major earthquake might result in a
disastrous consequence associated with the URM structures in the
region.
For rational estimation and reduction of the potential seismic
losses associated with URM structures, the seismic performance
level should be quantitatively measured through risk assessment
of such structures. Fragility analysis is an effective tool for risk
assessment of structural systems as it can be used for probabilistic
estimation of seismic losses and eventually enables decision-
making activities for seismic risk reduction.
Fragility curves for URM structures are currently available from
HAZUS [2], a seismic loss estimation framework developed by the
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). HAZUS uses a
systematic approach for probabilistic damage assessment of build-
ing structures, in which building response is characterized by
building capacity curves and seismic hazard is represented by
demand spectra (i.e., capacity spectrum method). The building
126 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137
fragility curves are then generated assuming a lognormal distribu-
tion in which distribution parameters consist of the median capac-
ity and damage variability. Although it is desirable to obtain these
distribution parameters from either an analytical or experimental
approach, HAZUS defines these parameters in most cases based
on expert judgment [3]. More accurate fragility curves incorpo-
rating rigorous modeling of nonlinear behavior of URM structures
are scarce in the field of earthquake engineering at the present
time. This study performs seismic fragility analysis of low-rise URM
building structures using a simplified modeling method that can
be effectively used for fragility analysis without significant loss of
computation time, and which maintains an acceptable level of ac-
curacy in representing the nonlinear behavior of the structures.
Low-rise URM structures are usually characterized by their
relatively stiff yet quite brittle structural behavior. The behavior
of URM walls is typically characterized with respect to either in-
plane or out-of-plane loadings (referred to hereafter as ‘‘in-plane’’
or ‘‘out-of-plane’’). URM walls usually exhibit very high in-plane
elastic stiffness and very little out-of-plane stiffness. Out-of-plane
failures are generally quite brittle unless significant compressive
loads are present, but in-plane cracking can lead to relatively
ductile behavior of perforated (i.e., by windows, doors, etc.) walls
if significant pier rocking is developed. Many of the URM essential
facilities located in the CSUS region are constructed with wooden
floor and roof diaphragms that are rather flexible and are often
poorly tied into the walls. As a result, the seismic response of
such URM structures are often more complex than expected.
FEMA guidelines for seismic analysis and rehabilitation of building
structures [4] states that the out-of-plane stiffness of walls should
be neglected while only masses should be considered in structural
modeling of URM buildings. This implies that the contribution of
the out-of-plane wall stiffness to the dynamic response of URM
structures is minimal and should be ignored in the modeling and
analysis for conservatism. Some studies, however, show that the
dynamic response of an URM building structure could be greatly
affected by the out-of-plane wall stiffness [4,5]. If out-of-plane
walls are well-connected to the adjacent URM components such
as in-plane walls or floor diaphragms, the out-of-plane walls could
contribute more to the overall response of the URM building. As
a consequence, we can say that no generally accepted approach
exists at the present time as to whether the out-of-plane wall
stiffness should be considered in modeling URM structures in the
absence of rigid diaphragms.
This study has two objectives. One is to develop model-based
analytical fragility curves of low-rise URM buildings, of which
fragility curves are only available based on expert opinion at
the present time. A low-rise URM building representative of the
essential facilities in the CSUS region is selected and structurally
modeled with a simplified nonlinear spring model for effectiveness
in repetitive computation. The seismic responses of the URM
building subject to different levels of earthquake inputs are then
probabilistically estimated considering the randomness in its
material properties to yield the fragility curves. The model-based
analytical fragility curves developed in this study can increase
the accuracy and effectiveness of seismic risk assessment of
essential facilities of the CSUS region. Moreover, the structural
modeling method introduced in this study can be effectively used
for development of the fragility curves of an individual URM
building with a particular configuration. Another objective of this
study is to investigate the effect of considering the out-of-plane
wall stiffness on the seismic performance of the URM building
structures. The fragility curves are developed for three different
configurations of out-of-plane wall stiffness and compared to one
another to investigate the effect of the out-of-plane wall stiffness
on the seismic performance. This effort demonstrates the needs
of considering the effect of the out-of-plane wall stiffness in
modeling and analysis of URM building structures for seismic risk
assessment.
Fig. 1. Typical low-rise URM building in the CSUS region.
2. Representative URM building structure
Typical URM essential facilities in the CSUS region are relatively
small and low-rise (one or two-story in height). The structure
is composed of two main components: the URM bearing walls
and the floor and roof diaphragms. The walls are generally
stiff and constructed with many openings or perforations for
windows and doors. The diaphragms are usually constructed of
timber and, as a result, are much more flexible than the walls. A
benchmark building is selected as representative of existing URM
low-rise buildings in the CSUS region. This particular building has
been designed and constructed for an experimental study [6] to
determine the lateral load resistance of a URM building (Fig. 1).
The full-scale 2-story test building has been designed to represent
the typical construction of an existing URM firehouse in the CSUS
region. Four unreinforced masonry walls, referred to as Wall A,
Wall B, Wall 1, and Wall 2, define the test structure. The detailed
dimensions of each wall and a plan view are shown in Fig. 2.
The building is 7.3 m (24 ft) by 7.3 m in plan and has story
heights of 3.7 m (12 ft) and 3.0 m (10 ft) for the first and second
floor, respectively. Wall A and, on the opposite side, Wall B are of
the same configuration to maintain an axis of symmetry for the
building. Wall 1 only has a door on the first floor and two window
openings on the second floor. On the other hand, Wall 2 has a
large door opening in the bottom floor designed to represent a fire
apparatus entrance.
Material properties are obtained from the experimental stud-
ies [6], where masonry prism specimens and 4-brick specimens are
constructed for the tests. These material properties, however, are
for a newly constructed URM building. The majority of the URM
firehouses in the CSUS region were constructed prior to 1970 [1].
Strength and structural integrity of these buildings may experience
some degree of degradation over such a long period of time. In ad-
dition, construction materials (i.e., brick and mortar) that are older
than 50 years do not exhibit as high strength as similar materi-
als today. In order to truly represent existing URM structures in
the region, these factors should be taken into account in the struc-
tural models. One way to incorporate this age effect is to use lower
values for the strength parameters of masonry to reflect the de-
graded masonry condition. In this study, values offered by FEMA
guidelines [4] corresponding to URM structures in ‘‘fair condition’’
are used for determination of the material properties. The mate-
rial properties of the degraded URM buildings are listed in Table 1,
along with those of the newly constructed URM building obtained
from the material test.
 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137 127

Fig. 2. Detailed dimensions of the test structure [6].

Table 1 other by the interface elements representing the mortar. However,

Basic material properties for the URM test structures for the purpose of seismic fragility analysis of the URM building,
Properties Newly constructed Degraded URM repeated dynamic analyses are required and this approach can
URM (from (from FEMA 356) — quickly become impractical. As a result, a more tractable structural
material test) used for this study
model is used in this study.
Masonry density (kN/m3 ) 18.84 18.84 Under the earthquake excitation, the particular direction of
Masonry compressive 10.00 5.37 seismic loading cannot be anticipated. It is unlikely that the
strength (MPa)
Masonry elastic modulus (MPa) 4134 2955
actual earthquake loading will be in a direction aligned with the
Masonry bed-joint shear 0.41 0.18 building axes. In addition, many buildings have irregular layouts
strength (MPa) that can result in a building structure that behaves in complex
three-dimensional ways under seismic loadings. Therefore, three-
dimensional analysis should produce a more accurate description
3. Modeling URM buildings of the behavior of the structure, and this might include torsional
responses due to asymmetry of the rigidity and mass distributions
Masonry is a nonhomogeneous material made up of two of each component with respect to the loading direction. However,
components: the masonry bricks and the mortar. Masonry in the interest of achieving a simpler model for dynamic analysis,
properties are dependent upon the properties of its constituents. the models developed in this study are based on two-dimensional
Structural behavior of the masonry can be very complex even behavior only and it is assumed that the earthquake excitation
under static loadings. The most refined approach for analyzing a is parallel to Wall A and Wall B of the benchmark URM building
URM wall is the so-called brick-by-brick approach which models (i.e., in the symmetry plane). The 2D model presented in this study
individual masonry brick as a solid element connecting to each is simple enough for repetitive dynamic analyses, yet it is able
128 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137
Fig. 3. Composite spring model of Wall A and Wall B.
Fig. 4. Idealization of hysteresis behavior of each failure mode.
to capture most of the important nonlinear behavior of the wall
components and the diaphragms.
3.1. Modeling of in-plane walls
URM walls usually develop high initial elastic stiffness in the in-
plane direction resulting in a high elastic stiffness and low elastic
structural period for URM buildings. While undamaged URM walls
exhibit a very stiff linear elastic behavior for in-plane loading, the
walls will ultimately fail through a fracture process that can involve
diagonal cracking or bed joint fracture and sliding. Perforated
walls (i.e., walls with openings) can exhibit much more complex
behavior that is associated with localized failures in the masonry
piers, lintels and spandrels surrounding the openings. For these
cases, the behavior can range from almost pure ductile behavior
developed through pier rocking to highly nonlinear hysteretic
behavior developed through, for example, bed joint sliding.
In order to more realistically model the nonlinear behavior of
perforated in-plane walls, a simple composite nonlinear spring
model is utilized for this study [7,8]. The basic approach to develop
a composite spring model for the in-plane behavior of a URM wall
is to first subdivide the wall into distinct areas or segments, which
behave in a similar fashion as a solid URM wall. Each segment
of the URM wall is then represented by a nonlinear spring, and
the springs are assembled in series and parallel arrangements to
match the segment topology for the wall itself. Fig. 3 shows the
perforated URM wall (Wall A or B) of the benchmark structure
on the left side and the schematic view of the corresponding
composite spring model on the right. In this figure, springs number
1 and number 8 are not representative of any wall component, but
rather capture the story bending effects. In this composite spring
model, each component or segment is treated individually as a
solid masonry shear wall, and the stiffness and the strength are
determined accordingly from the models in FEMA 356 [4]. The
post-elastic hysteresis behavior of each wall segment is modeled
for different failure modes, and this can be idealized as shown in
Fig. 4.
The stiffness calculation of a solid wall in FEMA, however, is only
applicable for walls with ideal end conditions (either fixed–fixed
or fixed-free). The masonry piers in a perforated wall are typically
connected to other wall components below and above them. As a
result, it is difficult to characterize the actual boundary conditions
for the masonry piers because they cannot be regarded as truly
fixed–fixed. One approach to account for boundary conditions that
are less stiff than the assumed ideal fixed condition is to instead
assume a finite rotational restraint at each end (Fig. 5(b)). Another
approach is to simply increase the pier height while maintaining
the ideal fixed end conditions (Fig. 5(c)). For this study, the pier
height is altered to account for the less than ideal end fixity. In
other words, the pier height is increased by a factor, r, to create
a new ‘‘effective height’’. Details about the effective height method
and the development of the composite spring model can be found
in Refs. [7,8]. Table 2 shows properties of each segment in a
composite spring model for Wall A (or Wall B) and their governing
behavior calculated from FEMA 356 guidelines.
3.2. Modeling of out-of-plane walls
An out-of-plane wall is a building wall that is perpendicular
to the direction of the earthquake inputs, and its lateral stiffness
is significantly lower than that of the in-plane wall. Out-of-plane
failures are generally quite brittle unless significant compressive
loads are present. Failure or even collapse of the out-of-plane walls
under earthquakes is very likely if the connections between the
out-of-plane walls and the diaphragms and/or the in-plane walls
are not well constrained. Therefore, the dynamic behavior of out-
of-plane walls is quite complicated and difficult to characterize
because it could have multiple simultaneous failure modes [5]. In
this study, an out-of-plane wall is modeled with a single nonlinear
spring with bi-linear hysteresis behavior. Properties needed for
describing the dynamic behavior of an out-of-plane wall are
then its stiffness and strength. As mentioned earlier, one of the
objectives of this paper is to investigate the effect of considering
the stiffness of the out-of-plane wall on the seismic risk assessment
of URM building structures. For this, three cases are examined for
consideration of the out-of-plane wall stiffness as follows:
– Case 1 – The stiffness of the out-of-plane walls is neglected and
assumed to be zero. Only the mass of the out-of-plane wall is
considered for the dynamic analysis of the URM building. This
approach is consistent with the guideline provided by FEMA [4],
and could be considered as a conservative approach in terms of
estimating displacements.
 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137 129

Fig. 5. Concept of effective height and effective stiffness of URM pier.

Table 2
Properties of the in-plane walls
Segment Wall A and Wall B
Governing behavior Elastic stiffness (kN/m) Strength (kN)

2 Sliding 1.79 × 106 256.59

3 Rocking 5.55 × 104 32.93
4 Rocking 9.46 × 104 40.01
5 Rocking 1.04 × 105 40.01
6 Rocking 1.22 × 105 57.67
7 Sliding 1.44 × 106 351.59
9 Sliding 2.30 × 106 222.95
10 Rocking 1.22 × 105 20.07
11 Rocking 1.04 × 105 13.97
12 Rocking 1.04 × 105 13.97
13 Rocking 1.22 × 105 20.07
14 Sliding 1.86 × 106 205.72

Table 3
Properties of the out-of-plane walls
Out-of-plane wall properties Case 1 Case 2 Case 3
Wall 1 Wall 2 Wall 1 Wall 2 Wall 1 Wall 2
1st fl. 2nd fl. 1st fl. 2nd fl. 1st fl. 2nd fl. 1st fl. 2nd fl. 1st fl. 2nd fl. 1st fl. 2nd fl.

Stiffness (kN/m) 0 0 0 0 3355 5252 3355 5252 13069 20148 8322 20148
Strength (kN) 0 0 0 0 2.36 2.71 2.36 2.71 9.12 10.41 5.79 10.41

– Case 2 – The out-of-plane walls are modeled in such a way
that they are fixed at the top and bottom only, and the
connection to the in-plane walls along the side is ignored. Basic
bending theory is applied for calculation of the out-of-plane
wall stiffness. This configuration could be used for representing
the out-of-plane walls with degraded connection condition.
– Case 3 – The out-of-plane walls are assumed to have sound
connection to the in-plane walls and diaphragms along the
perimeter. Therefore, the out-of-plane wall stiffness should be
higher than that considered in Case 2. The stiffness of the
out-of-plane walls of the newly constructed URM building
is obtained from the finite element analysis of the full-scale
building testing [6]. It is assumed that the out-of-plane wall
stiffnesses of the degraded building can then be determined
based on the ratio of the masonry elastic modulus of the newly
constructed building and the degraded building.
For estimation of the out-of-plane wall strength, it is assumed
that a crack is initiated along the top or the bottom of the out-of-
plane wall when the maximum tensile stress exceeds the tensile
strength of the masonry, which is estimated as 89.6 kPa according
to FEMA [4]. Table 3 shows the resulting values for the out-of-plane
wall stiffness and strength of the degraded URM buildings of the
three cases.
3.3. Modeling of flexible diaphragms
Wooden floors and roofs in URM buildings are connected to
the bearing walls with simple connections that cannot transmit
bending. As a result, these components are modeled as flexible
diaphragms with extensional and shear stiffnesses. Floors made
from tongue-and-groove or plywood decking over wooden joists
are quite common in old URM construction in the region although
newer construction may involve poured concrete on light steel
decking. In either case, and especially for the wooden floors, the
shear stiffness is much less than the extensional stiffness and
usually is the defining characteristic of the floor. Laboratory tests
of typical and modified wooden flooring systems [9] confirm this
behavior and provide representative stiffnesses. It should also be
noted that these stiffnesses are nonlinear and are often accurately
characterized by a bilinear stiffness with hysteretic behavior. Floor
and roof diaphragms for the newly constructed test structure are of
identical construction, and their shear and extensional stiffnesses
are found to be 700 kN/m and 152.4 × 103 kN/m, respectively,
130 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137

Fig. 6. Nonlinear spring model representing a URM test structure.

Table 4
Maximum displacements at the top of the in-plane wall (Wall A) and out-of-plane wall (Wall 1)
Ground motions Max. disp. at the top of Wall A (cm) Max. disp. at the top of Wall 1 (cm)
Case 1 Case 2 Case 3 Case 1 Case 2 Case 3

m02_01s 0.13 0.10 0.09 13.54 9.86 6.86

m02_02s 0.09 0.10 0.06 9.14 10.03 5.41
m02_03s 0.11 0.10 0.07 11.35 11.25 7.04
m02_04s 0.07 0.07 0.05 6.76 7.72 5.41
m02_05s 0.10 0.09 0.08 9.93 8.84 6.02
m02_06s 0.10 0.08 0.07 10.82 9.50 6.55
m02_07s 0.07 0.07 0.05 10.01 7.62 4.37
m02_08s 0.11 0.08 0.06 9.65 8.20 6.10
m02_09s 0.08 0.07 0.05 10.19 7.85 5.44
m02_10s 0.08 0.09 0.07 9.93 9.17 5.38
Mean 0.09 0.09 0.07 10.13 9.02 5.84

based on the experimental study [5]. The degraded properties are
determined based on the ratio of the masonry elastic modulus of
the newly constructed building and the degraded building, which
is the same as the case of the walls. As a result, the shear and
extensional stiffnesses of the diaphragm are determined to be
500 kN/m and 109.0 × 103 kN/m, respectively.
3.4. Modeling of URM buildings
Computer program DRAIN-2DX [10] is selected in this study
for modeling the behavior of the URM test structure. While
DRAIN-2DX does not have a straightforward means to model URM
structures, it does include a versatile, zero-length spring element
with a variety of possible nonlinear behaviors. As described in
the previous sections, this simple nonlinear spring element can be
used to develop basic nonlinear models for simple URM structures
with flexible floor diaphragms. Each component in the model is
constructed using the DRAIN-2DX TYPE 04 zero-length nonlinear
spring element. A simple 2D model can be constructed by orienting
the 2D axis system in a horizontal plane. The complete URM
test structure is modeled by assembling the composite nonlinear
springs for each wall with the lumped wall masses, as illustrated in
Fig. 6. For illustration purposes, the in-plane walls are represented
in Fig. 6 by a single spring in each floor. However, the actual
model incorporates the nonlinear behavior of in-plane walls at a
component-level as displayed in Fig. 3.
It should be noted that the accuracy of the dynamic behavior
of the model cannot be fully verified in this paper because of the
lack of dynamic test data. Instead, the model incorporates the most
recent knowledge of the engineering modeling of URM building
structures, and therefore it is assumed that the peak displacement
response obtained from the analysis using the developed model
under a cyclic earthquake loading, which is of the main interest
in the fragility assessment, is reasonably accurate with marginal
errors.
Dynamic behavior of the URM building under earthquake
loadings is investigated by numerical computation of dynamic
responses using DRAIN-2DX. Ten uniform hazard synthetic ground
acceleration records with 2% probability of exceedance in 50 years
developed for the Memphis area [11] are applied and the
displacement responses of the URM structure with three cases
of the out-of-plane walls configurations are recorded. Table 4
summarizes the maximum displacements of both the in-plane and
out-of-plane walls computed during the application of the ground
excitations. The table shows that the maximum displacements due
to earthquake loadings are much higher in the out-of-plane wall
than they are in the in-plane wall. This finding confirms that the
out-of-plane walls are usually the most vulnerable component
in a URM building, and is consistent with the past research on
the nonlinear behavior of the URM out-of-plane walls, which also
shows very low out-of-plane strengths [12,13]. The table also
shows that the wall responses (both in-plane and out-of-plane)
decrease as the out-of-plane wall stiffness increases.
In the following sections, a fragility analysis is performed for
evaluation of the seismic performance of the URM building under
consideration. The effect of the out-of-plane wall stiffness on the
seismic risk assessment of URM buildings is also investigated.
 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137
Fig. 7. Concept of fragility curve.
4. Fragility analysis of the URM building
As shown in Fig. 7, fragility is defined as the probability
of the case study structure reaching or exceeding a specified
limit state under a given earthquake intensity level [14]. In
this figure, the shaded area represents a failure domain defined
from specific criteria, where a damage measure, D, exceeds
a specific threshold, dsi . Under a given earthquake level San ,
P [D ≥ dsi |San ] is the probability of the structural response
exceeding the i-th limit state expressed as a threshold, dsi , and
generally increases as the earthquake intensity level increases. This
probability could be calculated if the probability distribution of
the structural damage under a given earthquake level is obtained
by accounting for stochastic variations of material properties and
the earthquakes mentioned above. Therefore, estimation of the
probability distribution of the structural damage for levels of
earthquake yields fragility curves. The fragility curves of the URM
building are constructed following this concept in the following
sub-sections.
4.1. Damage measure and performance levels
Defining a measure for quantifying the buildings seismic
damage is the first important step of a fragility analysis. A damage
measure should be determined such that it can represent the
system level damage of a building caused by an earthquake.
A number of researchers have proposed damage measures
for buildings subject to earthquake loadings. Some utilize a
displacement-based measure such as a maximum roof drift ratio to
quantify damage [15]. Some use energy-based criteria that relate
the amount of hysteretic energy to the levels of damage [16]. Some
researchers combine the two parts and derive hybrid measures [15,
17]. However, there has been little consistency on the most
appropriate measure to quantify the seismic damage. In light of
these available damage measures, FEMA 356 proposes the use
of the maximum drift ratio to assess building performance and
131
levels of damage to structural components. The inter-story drift
is computed as the relative lateral displacement between floors
expressed as a percent of the story height at that floor (also called
a drift angle). Building performance or damage levels (generally
referred to as ‘‘limit states’’) are specified as a function of the
maximum drift the building sustains during an earthquake. In the
case of a URM building, three performance levels are defined in
FEMA 356. They include, Collapse Prevention (CP), Life Safety (LS),
and Immediate Occupancy (IO) performance levels. On the other
hand, HAZUS defines four limit states — Slight Damage, Moderate
Damage, Extensive Damage, and Complete Damage. Although the
limit states are first described in a qualitative manner, they must
be redefined in terms of a quantitative measure in order to perform
the fragility analysis. HAZUS uses the maximum drift ratio as the
damage measure following FEMA 356, and the threshold values
of the maximum drift ratio corresponding to the limit states are
defined based on comprehensive review of past studies on building
seismic damage. Descriptions of and the maximum drift limits
for the building performance levels defined in FEMA 356 and
HAZUS are displayed in Tables 5 and 6, respectively. In this study,
the limit states defined in HAZUS are adopted and the fragility
curves are developed accordingly, because the fragility curves to be
developed in this study are to be compared with those of HAZUS.
4.2. Earthquake inputs
In order to be relevant, the earthquake loadings that are applied
to the test structure must resemble seismic characteristics in the
same region. An ideal approach is to use actual ground motions
recorded from historical earthquake events. However, due to the
fact that the last major earthquake in this region was almost
200 years ago, the available recorded information for strong
ground motions is scarce.
Wen and Wu [11] developed a suite of synthetic ground
motions for three cities in Mid-America. These cities include
Carbondale, IL, Memphis, TN, and St. Louis, MO. Earthquakes are
132 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137

Table 5
Structural performance levels for URM structures [4]
Damage levels Structural performance levels
Collapse prevention S-5 Life safety S-3 Immediate occupancy S-1
Severe Moderate Light

Overall damage descriptions Extensive cracking. Face course and Extensive cracking. Noticeable in-plane Minor cracking of veneers. Minor spalling
veneer may peel off. Noticeable in-plane offsets of masonry and minor out-of-plane in veneers at a few corner openings.
and out-of-plane offsets. offsets No observable out-of-plane offsets.
Drift ratio 1.0% 0.6% 0.3%

Table 6
Structural performance levels for URM structures [2]
Structural performance levels
Complete damage Extensive damage Moderate damage Slight damage

Overall damage Structure has collapsed or is in
descriptions imminent danger of collapse due to
in-plane or out-of-plane failure of
the walls. Approximately 15% of the
total area of URM buildings with
Complete damage is expected to be
collapsed.
Drift ratio (Low code) 3.5%
Drift ratio (Pre code) 2.8%
In buildings with relatively large
area of wall openings most walls
have suffered extensive
cracking. Some parapets and
gable end walls have fallen.
Beams or trusses may have
moved relative to their supports.
1.5%
1.2%
Most wall surfaces exhibit diagonal
cracks; some of the walls exhibit
larger diagonal cracks; masonry
walls may have visible separation
from diaphragms; significant
cracking of parapets; some masonry
may fall from walls or parapets.
0.6%
0.5%
Diagonal, stair-step
hairline cracks on
masonry wall surfaces;
larger cracks around door
and window openings in
walls with large
proportion of openings;
movements of lintels;
cracks at the base of
parapets.
0.3%
0.2%

Table 7
Structural uncertainties for URM structures
Random parameters Distribution Mean COV

Masonry density (kN/m3 ) Lognormal 18.84 0.05

Masonry compressive strength (MPa) Lognormal 5.37 0.25
Masonry bed-joint shear strength (MPa) Lognormal 0.18 0.20
Damping (%) Uniform 5.0 0.115

are the major sources of structural uncertainty for the URM

Fig. 8. Acceleration spectra of the input ground motions.
generated based on two hazard levels: 10% and 2% probabilities of
exceedance in 50 years. Earthquake events are simulated with their
epicenters uniformly distributed around the New Madrid Seismic
Zone (NMSZ). The body wave magnitudes of these simulated
earthquakes range between 5 and 8. Local site effects and soil
amplification representative of the location of each city are also
taken into account in the simulation process. At the end, a suite
of 20 ground acceleration records are generated for each city
location (10 records for 10% probability level and 10 records for 2%
probability level). The 10 ground motion records for Memphis with
2% probability of exceedance in 50 years are used for this study.
The elastic acceleration spectrum of the input ground motions are
shown in Fig. 8, and the time-history plots can be found in Ref. [11].
4.3. Uncertain variables
Uncertainties associated with the URM building structure are
represented by considering the variations of certain material
properties. Past investigations suggest a number of the URM
material properties that exhibit uncertain properties [18–20].
Referring to the literature, it is assumed that masonry density,
compressive strength, bed-joint shear strength, and damping ratio
structures in this study, and these structural parameters are
represented as random variables. The variations in the stiffness,
strength, and the masses of the URM building components can
be represented by incorporating these random variables into
the structural modeling. Statistical descriptions of these random
variables are presented in Table 7. The mean values of the random
parameters are obtained from the experimental study [5] and
FEMA 356 while the probability distributions and dispersion
measures of the parameters are collected from several previous
studies [18–20]. Uncertainties inherent in the earthquake loading
are also considered by using a suite of input ground motions. That
is, different earthquakes with the same intensity level might cause
different responses of the structure. The spectral acceleration at
the fundamental period of the building is considered as earthquake
intensity measure in this study, and all ground motions in the suite
are scaled such that all have the same spectral acceleration value
for each level of earthquake demand.
4.4. Construction of fragility curves
The most direct means of statistical analysis to obtain proba-
bilistic description of the response is running a series of nonlinear
time-history analysis through Monte Carlo simulation [21]. How-
ever, it requires a relatively large number of simulations in order
to obtain a sufficiently reliable estimate for probability of dam-
age. Mann et al. [22] suggested that the number of simulations
might need to be of the order of 10,000 to 20,000 for approximately
95% confidence limit, depending on the function being evaluated.
It will be computationally impractical, if not impossible, to simu-
late thousands or even hundreds of nonlinear time-history analy-
ses. Therefore, Latin Hypercube sampling (LHS) technique [23,24]
 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137
(a) Case 1.
(c) Case 3.
Fig. 9. Distributions of drift ratio for selected input ground motion intensities.
is utilized in this study for efficiency of the simulation process. The
region of the probability distribution of each random variable is
divided into ten intervals such that all the intervals have equal
probability, and a value is randomly generated from each inter-
val and stratified. The ten stratified values are then randomly com-
bined without replacement along with ten ground motions to yield
ten combinations of random variables. Taking each combination of
random variables as an input, a dynamic time history analysis is
performed and the maximum drift ratio is calculated for each com-
bination. The values of the maximum drift ratio calculated for all
ten combinations of the random variables are then used for proba-
bilistic description of the drift ratio for a given level of ground mo-
tion. This step of calculating the drift ratio is performed over the
range of the input earthquake intensity from 0.1g to 3.0g with an
increment of 0.1g to obtain necessary data for generation of the
fragility curves. The fragility curves are generated for all three cases
of the out-of-plane configuration described in the previous section.
Fragility curves are developed for the limit states defined in
HAZUS, as discussed earlier. Note that the limit states defined for
‘‘pre code’’ URM low-rise structure in HAZUS is utilized, as it is
assumed that the structure is designed without consideration of
the seismic loadings. The distribution of the responses, i.e., the
maximum inter-story drift ratios, resulted from the analyses
with ten combinations of input random variables derived with
LHS mentioned above are obtained over the range of the input
earthquake intensity. Fig. 9 shows the response (i.e., drift ratio)
distribution of all three cases for selected earthquake intensity
levels. The dotted horizontal lines indicate the thresholds for the
HAZUS limit states, which are corresponding to the complete,
extensive, and moderate damage level from the top. In Case 1, most
data points are above the complete damage level line even for low
input earthquake levels. This shows that the structure is highly
vulnerable to even low earthquake intensity levels, and implies
that the structure has almost no tolerance to the seismic loading.
This is not realistic, as many low-rise URM buildings sustained low
to moderate level of earthquakes in the past. The reason why the
model yields extensive displacements is that the Case 1 structure
is modeled in such a way that only the mass of the out-of-plane
133
(b) Case 2.
walls is considered without consideration of the stiffness and the
relative displacements from the in-plane walls are only restrained
by the shear and extensional stiffness of the diaphragm. The out-
of-plane walls, however, should sustain the seismic loadings to
some degree. In addition, the stiffness could be even higher with
the contribution of its connectivity to the diaphragm and the in-
plane walls, as mentioned in the previous section. Therefore, the
Case 1 modeling approach is considered to be infeasible for use
in generation of the fragility curves in this study, especially as the
damage is measured in terms of the drift ratio.
According to Cornell et al. [25], a log-normal distribution for
the statistical description of the building response would be a
reasonable assumption. Parameters necessary to describe the log-
normal distribution, i.e., the log-normal mean (µln D ) and the
standard deviation (σln D ), can be estimated from the log-normal
probability plot of the data points. Fig. 10 shows the data points of
the maximum drift ratio for Case 2 and Case 3 plotted on the log-
normal probability paper along with the fitted lines for selected
ground motion intensities. The log-normal mean and standard
deviation can then be estimated from the y-intercept and the
slope of the fitted line, respectively. The median value of the
drift ratio for a given earthquake intensity is also calculated as
^ µln D
m D = e . The fitted lines in Case 2 and Case 3 show that
Case 2 apparently has larger median drift ratio response than that
of Case 3 for each level of earthquake intensity. The variance of
Case 3 is higher than that of Case 2, as the slopes of the fitted
lines of Case 3 are steeper that those of Case 2. The probability of
exceedance of the structures corresponding to different limit states
(i.e., slight damage = 0.2%, moderate damage = 0.5%, extensive
damage = 1.2%, complete damage = 2.8%) can then be calculated
using the obtained log-normal parameters. For example, the log-
normal mean and standard deviation of the drift ratio response of
Case 3 corresponding to the earthquake intensity of Sa = 0.6g
are −4.5114 and 0.41, respectively. The probability of exceedance
corresponding to complete damage is then calculated as,

ln(0.028) + 4.5114

P (D > 0.028|Sa = 0.6g ) = 1 − Φ
0.41
= 0.0112 (1)
134 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137

(a) Case 2. (b) Case 3.

Fig. 10. Log-normal probability plot of max. Drift ratio for selected earthquake intensities.

(a) Case 2. (b) Case 3.

Fig. 11. Log-normal fitting of fragility.

Table 8 limit states. Assuming log-normal CDFs for the fragility curves, the
Log-normal parameters for description of fragility curves fragility corresponding to a given damage state can be expressed
Case 2 Case 3 as a log-normal cumulative distribution function:
µln Sa σln Sa µln Sa σln Sa   
ln Sa /Ŝa
Slight damage −2.4528 0.2074 −1.8887 0.2929
FR (Sa ) = Φ   (2)
Moderate damage −1.7071 0.2261 −1.2192 0.3496 σln Sa
Extensive damage −0.9269 0.2243 −0.5047 0.3319
Complete damage −0.1040 0.1869 0.2818 0.3269
where, Ŝa and σln Sa indicate the median capacity and the variability
of the system, respectively, both being expressed in terms of
where, Φ (•) denotes standard normal cumulative distribution spectral acceleration. The log-normal parameters can be estimated
function (CDF). The values of probability of exceedance corre- by plotting the calculated values of the probability of exceedance
sponding to extensive, moderate, and slight damage are also cal- on log-normal probability sheets as shown in Fig. 11 and Table 8.
culated in a same manner and they are estimated 0.4145, 0.9725, The fitted fragility curves for Case 2 and Case 3 are shown in
and 0.9999, respectively. Fig. 12. The standard deviation for each level of damage states
The fragility curves of the structures corresponding to different in Case 3 is also larger than in Case 2. This is a result of the
limit states can then be generated by plotting the input earthquake fact that the standard deviation of the drift response for a given
level represented in terms of Sa and the probability of exceeding earthquake intensity (i.e., σln D|Sa ) is larger in Case 3 than in
 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137
(a) Case 2.
Fig. 12. Fitted fragility curves.
Table 9
Probability of exceeding limit states for different earthquake levels
Natural period (s) Earthquake level (prob. of Spectral
exceed.) acceleration (g)
Case 2 0.450 10% in 50 years 0.330
2% in 50 years 1.057
Case 3 0.276 10% in 50 years 0.390
2% in 50 years 1.057
Case 2 as previously mentioned. The median capacity for each level
of damage states in Case 3 is larger than in Case 2, which is as
expected because of the higher stiffness and strength of the out-
of-plane walls. It should be noted, however, that this cannot be
used as a direct proof that the seismic performance of Case 3 is
better than that of Case 2. This is because the earthquake intensity
measure used for generation of the fragility curves is a spectral
acceleration, which is determined depending on the natural period
of a particular structure. That is, single earthquake could result in
different spectral accelerations for different structures. Therefore,
for comparison of the seismic performance of more than two
structures, it is important to consider a spectral acceleration
corresponding to each structure and its probability of exceedance.
The US Geological Survey (USGS) provides an interactive website
(http://eqhazmaps.usgs.gov/) where the spectral accelerations of
several probabilistic earthquake hazard levels (10%, 5%, and 2%
probability of exceedance in 50 years) corresponding to several
different period values (0.2, 0.3, and 1.0 s) can be obtained for any
particular location within the US by entering the zip code. Based
on the resulting spectral accelerations, the site class information
for the location is used to construct a response spectrum of
an earthquake with an arbitrary probability of exceedance.
Using these response spectra, the spectral acceleration values
corresponding to two different levels of probability of exceedance
– 2% and 10% in 50 years – for Case 2 and Case 3 are obtained.
The probability of exceeding various limit states for both cases
can then be read from the fragility curves. Table 9 shows the
probability of exceeding limit states for different earthquake levels.
The fundamental period of the structure is estimated as 0.450 s
for Case 2 and 0.276 s for Case 3. These periods are consistent
with values presented in results of prior experimental research [6]
and also with values listed in HAZUS [2]. However, it should be
noted that these periods are relatively higher than the fundamental
period calculated for the one-story URM building studied by
Kim et al. [5]. The periods presented in this study are higher
because the structure under consideration has two stories, and
also because the current structure has flexible diaphragms. It
should also be noted that the out-of-plane walls are taken into
consideration in the modeling of the structure in this study. It is
135
(b) Case 3.
Probability of exceeding limit states
Slight damage Moderate damage Extensive damage Complete damage
1.000 0.996 0.209 0.000
1.000 1.000 0.999 0.803
0.999 0.786 0.094 0.000
1.000 0.999 0.954 0.244
observed that overall the Case 3 structure shows better seismic
performance (i.e., less probability of exceeding a damage state)
over the Case 2 structure. For the earthquake level of 10/50 PE (10%
probability of exceedance in 50 years), the probability of exceeding
a damage state of the Case 2 structure is almost unity up to the
moderate damage state, but suddenly decreases for the extensive
and complete damage states. On the contrary, the probability of
exceeding a damage state of the Case 3 structure decreases more
gradually from the slight to the complete damage states. For the
earthquake level of 2/50 PE, both the Case 2 and Case 3 structures
show high vulnerability. However, the Case 3 structure shows
better performance in that it has the probability of exceeding the
complete damage state of 24.4%, whereas the Case 2 structure
has 80.3%.
The difference of the seismic performance of the two cases
is quite pronounced, which shows that the seismic performance
estimation of low-rise URM buildings is sensitive to the degree
of consideration of the out-of-plane wall stiffness and strength.
This means that although the out-of-plane wall stiffness is much
lower than the in-plane wall stiffness as previously mentioned, the
effect of the out-of-plane wall to the overall seismic performance
of an URM building structure should not be neglected. Therefore,
the out-of-wall stiffness and strength should be appropriately
modeled considering the condition of its connection to the in-plane
walls and diaphragms for effective seismic risk assessment of URM
buildings.
The seismic performance of low-rise URM buildings observed
from Table 9 and Fig. 12 can be compared with the performance
level recommended by the current seismic code to measure its rel-
ative vulnerability. The seismic performance level corresponding
to the Basic Safety Objective (BSO) of building structures suggested
by FEMA 356 [4] is to ensure the ‘‘Life Safety’’ level and the ‘‘Col-
lapse Prevention’’ level for the earthquake level of 10/50 PE and
2/50 PE, respectively. From the damage descriptions and drift ra-
tios presented in Tables 5 and 6, it can be stated that the ‘‘Life
Safety’’ level and the ‘‘Collapse Prevention’’ level defined in FEMA
356 are consistent with the ‘‘Moderate Damage’’ and the ‘‘Exten-
sive Damage’’ of HAZUS, respectively. For both cases (i.e., Case 2
and Case 3), the URM building analyzed in this study has more
than 70% probability of exceeding the moderate damage state for
136 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137
(a) Case 2 vs. HAZUS.
Fig. 13. Comparison of fragility curves.
Fig. 14. Comparison of median Sa of fragility curves for different limit states.
the earthquake level of 10/50 PE, and more than 90% probability
of exceeding the extensive damage state for the earthquake level
of 2/50 PE. Moreover, the probability of exceeding the complete
damage state for the 2/50 earthquake is more than 20% for Case
3 and is more than 80% for Case 2. Overall, these results indicate
that the seismic performance of URM buildings is well below the
desirable building seismic performance level recommended by the
seismic code, indicating high vulnerability of URM buildings within
the CSUS region.
5. Fragility comparison
As previously mentioned, HAZUS fragility curves are the only
available ones for low-rise URM buildings at this time. The fragility
curves of the URM structures developed in this study are compared
with the HAZUS fragility curves. Note that the comparison is made
for the HAZUS fragility curves developed for pre code low-rise URM
building, as it is assumed that the building is designed without any
consideration of seismic loading. For the comparison, the fragility
curves of HAZUS are converted such that their fragility parameters
are consistent with those developed in this study. As previously
mentioned, the fragility curves in HAZUS are constructed by
the nonlinear capacity spectrum method [2], where the capacity
is expressed in terms of spectral displacements. Accordingly,
the HAZUS fragility curves are represented in terms of spectral
displacement whereas the fragility curves developed in this study
are described by spectral acceleration. Therefore, the x-axis of
the HAZUS fragility curves should be converted from spectral
displacement to spectral acceleration. The conversion process is
briefed as follows:
1. Select several input earthquake levels expressed in terms of
probability of exceedance (e.g., 2%, 5%, and 10% of probability
of exceedance in 50 years).
(b) Case 3 vs. HAZUS.
2. Construct the demand spectra (response spectra) correspond-
ing to the selected earthquake levels and the capacity spectrum
of the target structure (URM low-rise).
3. Obtain the spectrum displacements that are corresponding to
the selected earthquake levels from the intersections of the
demand spectra and the capacity spectrum.
4. From the HAZUS fragility curves for pre-code URM low-rise
building, read the values of the probability of exceedance
corresponding to the selected earthquake levels for various
limit states.
5. Construct the plot of the probability of exceedance versus the
spectral acceleration read corresponding to the natural period
of the URM structure from the response spectrum.
6. Obtain log-normal parameters (µln Sa and σln Sa ) from the curve-
fitting for construction of the fragility curves.
The converted HAZUS fragility curves expressed in terms of
spectral acceleration are compared with the fragility curves
developed for the Case 2 and Case 3 structures in this study. Fig. 13
shows the comparison of the two sets of fragility curves. Overall,
the fragility curves developed in this study (Case 2 and Case 3)
are steeper than those of HAZUS. This implies that the variability
of the seismic response of the Case 2 and Case 3 structures is
smaller than that of HAZUS. In the comparison of Case 2 and
HAZUS, the Case 2 structure is more vulnerable for lower limit
states (i.e., slight, moderate and most of extensive damage states)
as the median capacity values of Case 2 are apparently smaller
than those of HAZUS. For complete damage state, median capacity
values are almost the same but the variability of Case 2 is smaller
than that of HAZUS. In the comparison of Case 3 and HAZUS,
the Case 3 structure is more vulnerable for slight and moderate
limit states. However, the median capacity of the Case 3 structure
corresponding to complete damage state is greater than that of
HAZUS. This tendency is better viewed with the plot of the median
capacity values of the fragility curves for different limit states
versus the corresponding drift ratios, which is presented in Fig. 14.
Several explanations for the observed differences are as follows.
– The fragility curves presented in HAZUS are generated using
lognormal distribution parameters that are defined based on
expert judgment, whereas the fragility curves developed in this
study are based on analytical nonlinear modeling and time
history analysis.
– The fragility curves developed above are of a particular
structure and do not represent the URM building stock in
a region (i.e., a class of structure), although the structure
represents a typical low-rise URM building in the CSUS region.
On the contrary, the HAZUS fragility curves are developed
aiming for seismic risk assessment of regional building stock.
The level of uncertainty in assessing the damage distribution
 J. Park et al. / Engineering Structures 31 (2009) 125–137
of a building stock over a particular region would be higher
compared to an individual structure. This effect results in
the relatively low variation of the analytical fragility curves
developed in this study. In order to develop analytical fragility
curves for a regional building stock, the geometrical variation
should be considered in addition to the material uncertainty.
– Consideration of the out-of-plane wall stiffness in the analytical
fragility curves increases the seismic capacity. This tendency is
more pronounced for higher limit states.
6. Conclusions
Model-based analytical fragility curves for a 2-story unrein-
forced masonry building typical of the CSUS region are devel-
oped in this study. These fragility curves are distinguished from
the existing fragility curves in HAZUS, in that the HAZUS fragility
curves are derived using selected parameters which are based on
the subjective judgments of experts. A simplified spring model is
developed to describe the highly nonlinear dynamic behavior of
URM structures in an effective manner, and a typical URM low-rise
building is modeled for the fragility analysis. The fragility curves
are then generated for the structure considering the uncertainties
in both the seismic demand and the material properties.
The fragility analysis shows that the seismic performance of
URM buildings is well below the desirable building seismic per-
formance level recommended by the seismic code, demonstrating
the high vulnerability of the URM buildings within the CSUS region.
It is also shown that the out-of-plane wall stiffness should not be
ignored in the risk assessment of URM buildings because without
consideration of the out-of-plane wall stiffness, the vulnerability of
the URM building is estimated to be unrealistically high. The over-
all seismic performance of URM buildings is rather sensitive to the
out-of-plane wall stiffness. This fact emphasizes the importance of
modeling the out-of-plane walls of URM buildings for more accu-
rate seismic risk analysis.
The comparison of the analytical fragility curves with the
HAZUS curves shows that the analytical fragility curves developed
in this study have lower variability in the seismic response than
those of HAZUS. The first reason for the difference is that the
development approach of the two sets of fragility curves are
different (i.e., model-based vs. expert judgment). Nonetheless, the
HAZUS fragility curves are aimed for risk assessment of a building
stock in a region, whereas the analytical fragility curves presented
here are developed for an individual building. For development
of analytical fragility curves for a building stock in a region, the
geometrical variation as well as the material uncertainty should
be considered in the regional analysis.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported primarily by the Mid-America
Earthquake Center (MAE) through the Earthquake Engineering
Research Centers Program of the National Science Foundation
under NSF Award No. EEC-9701785. Any opinions, findings and
conclusions or recommendations expressed in this paper are those
137
of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the National
Science Foundation.
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