The Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem: Analysis of a Local Structural Consolidation

Abstract

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Assessment of Seismic Damage in Nativity Church in Bethlehem Using Pushover Analysis

“…The Nativity Church restored and some components rebuilt again many times, so it has different materials which can be noticed through visual inspection, but it is difficult to use in-situ inspection techniques such as coring, flat jack test, sonic tomography, thermo vision, etc., due to privacy and saintliness, as well as the political situation and lack of technology and available devices. The mechanical properties of the materials used in the numerical model will be used based on onsite tests, which have been carried out by [26]. These tests focused on the structural components of the Church and the material properties of masonry walls like compressive strength (Fm), shear strength (td), Young's modulus (E), shear modulus (G), Poisson coefficient (υ), and self-weight (w).…”

“…For example, the Load Step (9), has a crack width of 2.40 mm, and for the Load Step (11), the crack width was 2.29 mm, which means that the difference was 5%. [26] found that it is obvious that crack propagation is reliable in the investigation of the historical masonry structures, as not only the bandwidth of cracks is checked, but also the length of cracks can be checked and investigated, and give a good indication of what will happen for seismic loads. On another hand, the out-of-plane stiffness of the church is lower than in-plane stiffness, the Y-direction was more deformed and had a larger crack width, numerically, the maximum crack width before Load Step (10), i.e., Load Step (9) was 2.80 mm, and after the Load Step (10), i.e., Load Step ( 12), was 10.40 mm.…”

“…Alessandri et al [26] proposed an innovative technique for reinforcing the wall of the Nativity Church in Bethlehem against earthquakes, 3-D modal analysis of the entire church revealed that the structure is characterized by clear local modes of vibration. This showed that in the event of an earthquake, a Crusade-era wall addition is at risk of collapse via simple overturning around its base, due to the lack of firm connections with the orthogonal walls of the façade and the transept.…”

Experimental and Theoretical Research on Shear Strength of Seismic‐Damaged SRC Frame Columns Strengthened with Enveloped Steel Jackets

“…In practical engineering, the mechanical properties of the enveloped steel jacket are excellent, because it is more convenient in construction [3]. e effective method of SRC structure reinforcement has been applied more and more widely in the USA, Canada, Japan and in Europe recently [4,5]. Hence, for existing concrete structures, a thorough evaluation of seismic-damaged SRC columns which confined with enveloped steel jacket need to mitigate shear failure under earthquake loading, whereas for new concrete structures, the confined columns must be designed with sufficient shear capacity to sustain the whole building in an earthquake [6][7][8].…”