Enhanced Residential Building Code for Tornado Safety
Publication: Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities
Volume 30, Issue 4
Abstract
The EF5 tornado that occurred in Moore, Oklahoma on May 20, 2013, provided a rare opportunity to study the effects of multiple major tornadoes on a single community in a relatively short timeframe. Data collected immediately after the tornado indicate an ordered progressive collapse mechanism for residential wood-frame structures with slightly different progressions for low-pitch and high-pitch roofs. This failure progression indicates that a continuous load path from the roof to the foundation is the most important aspect of design and construction for tornado resistance of residential structures. Performance of homes in a neighborhood constructed using more-robust methods indicates that the damage path caused by an major tornado can be narrowed by improving the overall structural system with a series of relatively simple items. Twelve code modifications proposed by the authors to create a more-robust structural system intended to withstand winds up to (135 mph), or an EF2 rating, are presented in this paper. The city of Moore adopted these code changes on March 17, 2014.
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Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge the financial support of the National Science Foundation under RAPID Grant No. 1348609. They would also like to acknowledge the contribution of the other members of the research team from the University of Oklahoma, the University of Alabama, Mississippi State University, University of Florida, Oklahoma State University, Oregon State University, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, and Colorado State University in collecting the data used in designing these code changes.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities
Volume 30 • Issue 4 • August 2016
Copyright
© 2015 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Apr 7, 2015
Accepted: Jul 28, 2015
Published online: Oct 20, 2015
Discussion open until: Mar 20, 2016
Published in print: Aug 1, 2016
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