Papers

The safety and resilience of school buildings against natural disasters is of paramount importance since schools represent a reference point for communities. Such significance is not only related to the direct consequences of collapse on a vulnerable part of the population, but also due to the importance of schools in the post-disaster recovery. This work is focused on the risk and resilience assessment of school buildings in Lisbon (Portugal) under seismic events. The results of this study, in which a subset of 32 schools are analyzed, are used to define a prioritization strategy to mitigate the seismic risk of the Lisbon City Council school building portfolio and to assess the overall resilience of the school network. Numerical modeling of the school buildings is performed in order to estimate losses in terms of the built-up area of the schools and recovery times associated with different seismic scenarios, which are probabilistically defined specifically for the sites of the buildings, accounting for the local soil conditions and associated amplification effects. Based on the obtained risk estimates, which are compared to reference values established on international guidelines and specialized literature, the Lisbon City Council and LNEC jointly defined a short- and medium-term risk mitigation plan, starting with a detailed inspection and assessment of the most vulnerable school buildings and continuing to the implementation of retrofitting measures.

O SAFEPORT-SINES é um sistema de previsão e alerta para a segurança da navegação em zonas portuárias, englobando situações de emergência associadas a navios em trânsito ou amarrados, devidas a condições meteo-oceanográficas extremas. O sistema fornece previsões com 3 dias de antecedência da agitação marítima, das condições de vento e de maré, assim como dos movimentos dos navios, identificando as situações que possam ter consequências gravosas nos navios em manobra ou amarrados dentro do porto. Os níveis de risco associados baseiam-se em critérios de segurança e de operacionalidade, nomeadamente nos movimentos do navio e nos esforços nos elementos de amarração. Neste trabalho apresenta-se o sistema SAFEPORT em termos do seu desenvolvimento e arquitetura, do fluxo e tratamento de dados e do funcionamento dos modelos numéricos utilizados. Apresenta-se ainda o funcionamento da plataforma web e da aplicação móvel onde é possível consultar os parâmetros relevantes para aferir os riscos referidos

SAFEPORT safety system aims at forecasting and alerting, on a regular basis, emergency situations regarding ships operation in port areas caused by extreme weather-oceanographic conditions. It uses forecasts provided offshore of the area under study of sea agitation, wind and tide. The characterization of the response of the free and moored ships at a berth is performed using the numerical package SWAMS. The system issue alerts, through danger levels associated with risk levels of exceedance of recommended values for movements and forces imposed on ship mooring systems. SAFEPORT can be adapted to any port. So far, it has been developed and adapted to three terminals of the port of Sines, where three different ships were simulated. This paper presents the developments made to date of the safety system, which includes tests performed in storm situations. The numerical models run every day, in real-time mode, in a computer cluster and the system provide forecast results for the next 72 hours. The results are disseminated on a web page and a mobile application in a variety of formats. It was concluded that the SAFEPORT safety system issued alerts according to the observed reality during the storm Dora. It has also been shown to be a computer tool for the optimization of ship mooring systems. The system is currently in testing and validation phase therefore, forecasts should be interpreted as indicative.

Salt decay is one of the main decay mechanisms of the porous building materials but due to its complexity progress has been slow, both regarding the understanding of the mechanism itself and the definition of mitigation solutions. Research has so far privileged a reductionist approach, focusing on the behavior of a few individual salts. However, the typical reality of these constructions are multi-ionic solutions from which, depending on the conditions, different types of salts can precipitate in different crystalline forms. The originality of Arnold and Zehnder was that they did not embrace reductionist approaches, maintaining the focus on salt mixtures and the way these behave in real constructions. This path led to approaches to the problem and possible mitigation solutions that have not yet been adequately discussed and explored. In this review, I seek to identify the most interesting contributions of the two authors and the directions they suggest for future research.

Docking of very large ships is a delicate procedure as the kinetic energy associated with large masses of the ship can result in high impact forces causing damages to the ship, the fenders and even the quay itself. The expected berthing loads are a key element in quay design. Fenders are usually rubbery flexible elements that turn the vessel

Docking of very large ships is a delicate procedure as the kinetic energy associated with large masses of the ship can result in high impact forces causing damages to the ship, the fenders and even the quay itself. The expected berthing loads are a key element in quay design. Fenders are usually rubbery flexible elements that turn the vessel

The To-SEAlert project (Fortes et al., 2021) aims to include a set of tools/methodologies into the Early Warning System HIDRALERTA (Poseiro, 2019, Fortes et al., 2020, Pinheiro et al., 2020) to make it more efficient, reliable and robust.

Neste artigo, dedicado à temática da garantia de condições globais de segurança em soluções residenciais especialmente adequadas para idosos e pessoas fragilizadas, mas marcadas por um essencial quadro intergeracional, participativo e bem integrado em termos sociais, urbanos e arquitetónicos, abordam-se, sequencialmente, as seguintes matérias: (1) aspetos globais de segurança numa habitação adequada a idosos, assunto este estruturado, em termos de níveis físicos, nas temáticas da segurança na vizinhança e da segurança na habitação ; (2) questões considerada fundamentais da segurança residencial ligada à crítica ocorrência de acidentes domésticos ; (3) e, finalmente, uma atenção específica ao muito grave problema das quedas na habitação para fragilizados.

This paper is focused on the study of the dynamic behaviour of two large arch dams, and it presents some innovations for the improvement of Seismic and Structural Health Monitoring (SSHM) systems for dams. The work describes a methodology based on the integrated use of software for automatic monitoring data analysis and of computational 3D finite element (3DFE) models for dam dynamic behaviour simulation. The monitoring data analysis software was developed for automatic modal identification, in order to obtain natural frequencies and mode shapes, for automatic detection of vibrations induced by seismic events, to be distinguished from those caused by other operational sources, and for comparison between results retrieved from measured vibrations and numerical results from 3DFE modelling. The numerical simulations are carried out using a 3DFE program developed for dynamic analysis of dam-reservoir-foundation systems, based on a solid–fluid coupled formulation and considering the dam-water dynamic interaction, including calculation modules for complex modal analysis and for linear and non-linear seismic analysis. The case studies are two large arch dams that have been under continuous dynamic monitoring over the last ten years: Cabril dam (132 m high), the highest dam in Portugal, and Cahora Bassa dam (170 m high), in Mozambique, one of the highest dams in Africa. The SSHM systems installed in both dams have similar schemes and were designed to continuously record accelerations in several locations at the upper part of the dam body and near the dam-foundation interface, using uniaxial and triaxial accelerometers. The most significant experimental results from continuous dynamic monitoring are presented and compared with numerical results for both dams, with emphasis on the evolution of natural frequencies over time, including the vibration mode shapes for various water levels, and on the measured accelerations during low-intensity seismic events. Furthermore, the main results of non-linear seismic response simulations are provided, considering the effects due to joint movements and tensile and compressive concrete damage, aiming to assess the seismic performance of both dams based on the Endurance Time Analysis method.

Marine fenders provide the necessary interface between berthing ships and berth structures (PIANC, 2002). Their absence can cause damage to either the quay or the ship or both the quay and the ship, endangering lives, and property. Due to the complex hydrodynamics around berthing ships, the characterization of the maximum force applied to an individual fender and the force distribution among a set of fenders is an essential factor in the design and safety of maritime structures and the fenders themselves, as well as for improving existing ones. This paper aims to describe a combining physical and numerical modelling of a ship impact on fenders, in order to improve the numerical modelling of this problem.Physical modelling represents a good practice in hydraulic studies, where a scale model is used to reproduce complex dynamic phenomena. However, the use of a sophisticated numerical model (or a package of numerical models) can provide a good means to evaluate the samecomplex physical processes and, in addition, to design and test a large number of alternatives in a short time span.Both types of models have their strengths and weaknesses (Gerritsen and Sutherland, 2011). Physical models provide a natural reproduction of complex non-linear physical phenomena, therefore they are well established and considered to be truthful. On the other hand, these models can be expensive and time consuming. In addition, one has to deal with the scale effect and measurement difficulties and errors are frequent. Numerical models in turn are very efficient to simulate rapidly many physical processes and the results can be easily extracted. On the other hand, to improve the reliability of their use in practice, it is necessary to calibrate several parameters through physical model measurements and field experiments. In order to take advantage of the potentiality of the two models emerged the composite modelling which is the integrated and balanced use of physical and numerical models (Gerritsen and Sutherland, 2011). This technique also costs but provides results with a better quality than those model techniques separately and increases the confidence in the use of numerical models.The physical modeling consists of a ship scaled model, whose impact on the fenders was performed in a wave basin. Various impact velocities and angles between the ship axis and the fenders alignment were used to represent possible collision conditions. The same conditions were reproduced by a numerical package. The numerical modeling was performed using MOORNAV (Santos, 1994), which estimates the ship motions and the forces exerted on the elements of the mooring system, namely mooring lines and fenders.