Preliminary Seismic Risk Assessment of Monolithic Columns of the Aphaia Temple in Aegina

Abstract

Studies on the seismic assessment of monumental structures of antiquity are mostly focused on the estimation of the structural behavior and do not involve the pertinent uncertainties. Towards filling this research gap, a preliminary seismic risk assessment of monolithic columns of the Aphaia Temple in Aegina island, Greece, is presented. A comprehensive application of the framework of Performance-Based Earthquake Engineering is carried out. Site-specific seismic hazard estimation is performed at first by employing Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Analysis. The rocking column is analyzed under seismic excitation by numerically solving the equation of motion in order to extract the fragility curves. Finally, the convolving of seismic hazard and structural response yields the seismic risk of the column that is used to estimate the mean annual rate of exceeding predefined limit states that are associated with damage and collapse of the column.

Intensity measures as interfacing variables versus response proxies: The case of rigid rocking blocks

“…All Blocks have been selected to represent simplified rectangular planar‐model analogues of rigid rocking ancient columns. Specifically, Block C resembles a monolithic free‐standing column of the Temple of Aphaia in Aegina, Greece, 50 whereas Block E alludes to a column of the Temple of Nike in Athens, Greece 51 . The remaining Blocks are selected to represent a range of sizes and shapes of columns in order to test potential IMs over a range of dynamic behaviors, encompassing tall (e.g., A, B) versus short (e.g., F), and slender (e.g., Ε) versus less‐slender (e.g., D) columns.…”

The influence of the vertical component of ground motion on the probabilistic treatment of the rocking response of free‐standing blocks

“…Some of them resemble existing structures whereas the rest are meant to create a range of realistic blocks of differing slenderness and size. Specifically, Block C represents a 2D analog of a monolithic freestanding ancient column of the Temple of Aphaia in Aegina, 17 Greece; Block E resembles a column of the Temple of Athene Nike in Athens, 26 Greece, whereas Block G is a 2D model of a 32U server cabinet rack, that is, a cabinet that can fit 32 standard rack units, each of 1.75 in or 4.445 cm of internal clear height. The four other blocks are arbitrary cases of slender (i.e., A, B) or less slender (i.e., D, F) blocks.…”

“…Since Housner's pioneer study in 1963, 1 the dynamics of the rocking response of unanchored rigid blocks have been the subject of numerous studies, [e.g., [2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13] ]. This interest stems from the application of the rocking oscillator as the seismic response mechanism in various structural types such as masonry structures [e.g., 14,15 ], monumental structures [e.g., 16,17 ], bridges [e.g., 18,19 ], or building unanchored contents [e.g., 20,21 ]. Most of the studies in the field have investigated thoroughly the response of the rocking oscillator under horizontal excitations.…”