Seismic load

basic concept in earthquake engineering

Seismic load is one of the basic concepts of earthquake engineering which means application of an earthquake-generated agitation[1] to a building structure or its model. It happens at contact surfaces of a structure either with the ground,[2] or with adjacent structures,[3] or with gravity waves from tsunami.

Presidential Palace in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, heavily damaged at 2010 Haiti earthquake.

Seismic loading depends, primarily, on:

Sometimes, seismic load exceeds ability of a structure to resist it without being broken, partially or completely. Due to their mutual interaction, seismic loading and seismic performance of a structure are intimately related.

Other websites

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  1. Hudson, D.E. (1979). Reading and Interpreting Strong Motion Accelerograms. EERI.
  2. The Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering Portal
  3. Seismic Pounding between Adjacent Building Structures