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[rni]

Dear Sefians: The following may be of interest to those who like to see
Earthquake Engineering practised as a modern scientific discipline, rather
than languishing as a thumb rule based colonial relic. You can
read/download the full paper at
http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/dec102006/1486.pdf
In case of difficulty in downloading you may contact me.
Thanks
RN Iyengar
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Seismic hazard estimation for Mumbai city

Editor's comments in Current Science (p 1434)

Seismic hazard estimation Peninsular India, once considered to
be free from strong seismic disturbances, is now known to be prone to
earthquake-related disasters. Koyna (1967), Khillari (1993), Jabalpur
(1999) and Bhuj (2001) earthquakes are fresh in our memory and any
complacency on this front would be a costly mistake. Since occurrence of
such shocks is not predictable, the country has to gear up to protect its
human habitat and build environment through sound principles of engineering
and progressive technology. There is an official Indian Standard
Code IS-1893 on how buildings should be designed against earthquakes.
But this document which had once seven and five seismic zones,
for computing the design basis forces, currently divides the vast country
into four ad hoc regions with no valid scientific basis. Raghu Kanth
and Iyengar argue (page 1486) that for big cities in India the existing
seismic hazard should be quantified on probabilistic basis, factoring in
regional seismicity and geology. This way, engineers would be in a
positionto select the design basis parameters most appropriate to the
location, local soil condition and socio-economic importance of the
structure. They present a case study for Mumbai, incorporating
all known geological and seismological information to arriveat design
specifications that engineers and administrators can directly
use in Mumbai. These are useful not only for new constructions but also
for chalking out strategies for protecting existing ones.
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