A Review of Blast Loading in the Urban Environment

Abstract

Urban blasts have become a significant concern in recent years. Whilst free-field blasts are well understood, the introduction of an urban setting (or any complex geometry) gives rise to multiple blast wave interactions and unique flow complexities, significantly increasing the difficulty of loading predictions. This review identifies commonly agreed-upon concepts or behaviours that are utilised to describe urban shock wave propagation, such as channelling and shielding, in conjunction with exploring urban characterisation metrics that aim to predict the effects on global blast loading for an urban blast. Likewise, discrepancies and contradictions are highlighted to promote key areas that require further work and clarification. Multiple numerical modelling programmes are acknowledged to showcase their ability to act as a means of validation and a preliminary testing tool. The findings contained within this review aim to inform future research decisions and topics better.

Special Issue on Explosion Effects in the Built Environment

“…However, the results suggest that shear failures were related to the laboratory four-point loading condition, as similar shear failures have not been observed in explosive detonations. This underlines the importance of the representative experimental and numerical simulations described in [1] and highlights the difficulty of achieving this under laboratory conditions.…”

“…Ratcliff et al [1] thoughtfully reviews the current state-of-the-art in blast engineering and identify common ways that shock propagation in urban areas is described, as well as discussing areas of disagreement among researchers that need addressing in the future. The importance of carefully controlled and representative experimental and numerical simulation tools, especially on a smaller scale for improved fidelity and cost-effectiveness, are highlighted as key areas for future development.…”

Blast Effects on Hyperloop’s Cylindrical Thin-Shell Structures

“…The threats to critical infrastructures such as hyperloop systems exist in the transportation industry [38][39][40][41]. In many countries, such a risk is deemed to be very to extremely high [42][43][44]. Our study is thus critical to protect and to improve resilience of the transportation infrastructures.…”

The Effect of Scaling Building Configuration Blast Experiments on Positive Phase Blast Wave Parameters

“…These include building geometry in singular structure experiments [11][12][13][14], environmental landscapes [15], protective structures [16,17], and the influence of cities [18][19][20] and street configurations [20,21], for example. For a review of blast wave interaction effects with structures conceptualised as obstacles, the reader is directed to Isaac et al [22], while Radcliff et al [23] contain a comprehensive review of blast loading in urban settings.…”