Tsunami Loads on a Representative Coastal Bridge Deck: Experimental Study and Validation of Design Equations
Publication: Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering
Volume 146, Issue 5
Abstract
Fluid impact forces on a bridge superstructure in the horizontal and vertical directions due to tsunami inundation, represented by a solitary wave, were investigated through a large-scale laboratory experiment and numerical simulations. The experiment was conducted in a two-dimensional large wave flume using a 1:5 scale steel girder and concrete slab bridge model, tested under shallow water waves at two water depths. Wave forces measured in the experiment were used to validate and assess the numerical predictive capability of a nonlinear hydrodynamic model. A numerical parametric study was conducted to determine the effect of variations in bridge elevation and wave height on the magnitude of the horizontal and vertical forces and overturning moment. Finally, an improved simplified design procedure based on the experimental and numerical results is proposed.
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Acknowledgments
The experimental work described in this paper was funded by the Federal Highway Administration under Contract DTFH61-07-C-00031 awarded to the University of Nevada, Reno. The authors also wish to recognize the staff of the Hinsdale Wave Research Laboratory at Oregon State University for their assistance during the experiments.
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Published In
Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering
Volume 146 • Issue 5 • September 2020
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© 2020 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Aug 21, 2018
Accepted: Sep 13, 2019
Published online: May 15, 2020
Published in print: Sep 1, 2020
Discussion open until: Oct 15, 2020
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