Ecuador earthquake structural musings 2

[AnimusVox]

I'm curious if anyone else knows - do areas such as Ecuaador even have a building code?

Much of the destruction looks to be concrete structures (which I'm assuming was due to a reinforcement issue, either lack thereof or improper connections)

Here's a link of some of the damage so far

 

[JAE]

They most likely have building codes. The issue always is about when the particular buildings were constructed, who constructed them, what codes were in effect when they were constructed, and how "mature" are their codes with respect to proper seismic design, detailing and construction. Just like everywhere else, there's probably a wide range of seismic capacity in buildings.



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[Guest262653]

Of course not. Only the good old USA has the excellency to be able to produce a building code. The rest of the world if full of stone age dimwits that only pass themselves as engineers.

Link for the Ecuador building code (in spanish):

http://www.normaconstruccion.ec/

 

[JStephen]

Another issue is the extent to which the codes are enforced.

But note that many places in the US don't have a building code. Here in Texas, for example, there is a state-wide building code, but it only applies to commercial buildings. Otherwise, most of the building codes are imposed by city governments, and if you're not in the city limits, there's no code requirement and you can build what you want to.

Another issue is that the modern building codes are all based on the idea that we'll design so that the probability of the loads exceeding X level are reasonably low. But "reasonably low" is not zero, so you can build a brand-new structure to the latest code and have it destroyed the following day because that hurricane was stronger than it was supposed to be or whatever. Get another New Madrid earthquake in full force, and you'll have people in Ecuador asking "do they even have building codes up there?"

 

[hawkaz]

I found a website that compares ground motion of different magnitude earthquakes. If it is accurate, the Ecuador quake was 22 times higher than Loma Prieta. How do you think San Francisco would have held up to that?