An analytical model for far-field response spectra with soil amplification effects

Abstract

The seismic shear waves in the far field could be harzadous due to soil amplification. As such, the seismic risk needs to be reassessed for buildings on soft deposits with fundamental periods close to that of the soil. This was tragically demonstrated in the September 1985 Mexican earthquake. This paper proposes an analytical model which uses an accepted geophysical model incorporated with an amplification model to predict the acceleration response spectra for such cases. The proposed analytical model is more reliable than the statistical models which are accurate in areas where there is an abundance of seismic data or when specific influence of local ground condition is not important. © 1990.