Behaviour of Colliding Multi-Storey Buildings under Earthquake Excitation Considering Soil-Structure Interaction

This paper investigates the coupled effect of the supporting soil flexibility and pounding between neighbouring, insufficiently separated buildings under earthquake excitation. Two adjacent three-storey structures, modelled as inelastic lumped mass systems with different structural characteristics, have been considered in the study. The models have been excited using the time history of the Kobe earthquake of 1995. A nonlinear viscoelastic pounding force model has been employed in order to effectively capture the impact forces during collisions. A discrete element model has been incorporated to simulate the horizontal and rotational movements of the supporting soil. Numerical simulations have been performed using developed software based on the Mat lab code. The variation in storeys peak displacements, peak accelerations and peak impact forces for various gap sizes is presented in the paper and comparisons are made with the results obtained for colliding buildings with fixed-base supports. The results of the study indicate that the incorporation of the soil-structure interaction decreases both storey peak displacements and peak impact forces during collisions, whereas increase the peak accelerations at each floor level.