Effect of out-of-plane behavior on seismic fragility of masonry buildings in Turkey

This study focuses on the evaluation of seismic safety of unreinforced masonry buildings in Turkey by using fragility curves generated for two behavior modes of load bearing walls: in-plane and out-of-plane. During generation of fragility curves, a force-based approach has been used. There exist two limit states in terms of base shear strength for in-plane behavior mode and flexural strength for out-of-plane behavior mode. To assess the seismic vulnerability of unreinforced masonry buildings in Turkey, fragility curves generated for in-plane behavior were verified by the observed damage during the 1995 Dinar (Turkey) earthquake and fragility curves generated for out-of-plane behavior were verified by the observed damage during the 2010 ElazA +/- AY (Turkey) earthquake. The verification results reveal that the proposed fragility-based procedure can provide an alternative for the seismic safety evaluation of unreinforced masonry buildings in Turkey. Using this procedure, it becomes possible to investigate a large population of masonry buildings located in regions of high seismic risk in a short period of time. The obtained results are valuable in the sense that they can be used as a database during the development of strategies for pre-earthquake planning and risk mitigation for earthquake prone regions of Turkey.