• Architectural research
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.151-158
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• 2013

Offshore oil and gas process plants are exposed to hazardous accidents such as explosion and fire, so that the structural components should resist such accidental loads. Given the possibilities of thousands of different scenarios for the occurrence of an accidental hazard, the best way to predict a reasonable size of a specific accidental load would be the employment of a probabilistic approach. Having the fact that a specific procedure for probabilistic accidental hazard analysis has not yet been established especially for explosion and fire hazards, it is widely accepted that engineers usually take simple and conservative figures in assuming uncertainties inherent in the procedure, resulting either in underestimation or more likely in overestimation in the topside structural design for offshore plants. The variation in the results of a probabilistic approach is determined by the assumptions accepted in the procedures of explosion probability computation, explosion analysis, and structural analysis. A design overpressure load for a sample offshore plant is determined according to the proposed probabilistic approach in this study. CFD analysis results using a Flame Acceleration Simulator, FLACS_v9.1, are utilized to create an overpressure hazard curve. Moreover, the negative impulse and frequency contents of a blast wave are considerably influencing structural responses, but those are completely ignored in a widely used triangular form of blast wave. An idealistic blast wave profile deploying both negative and positive pulses is proposed in this study. A topside process module and piperack with blast wall are 3D FE modeled for structural analysis using LS-DYNA. Three different types of blast wave profiles are applied, two of typical triangular forms having different impulse and the proposed load profile. In conclusion, it is found that a typical triangular blast load leads to overestimation in structural design.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.717-725
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• 2018

One of the most important design criteria in military tunnels and armoured doors is to resist the blast loads with minimum structural weight. This can be achieved by using steel sandwich panels. In this paper, the nonlinear behaviour of steel sandwich panels, with different core materials: (1) Hollow (no core material); (2) Rigid Polyurethane Foam (RPF); and (3) Vulcanized Rubber (VR) under free air blast loads, was investigated using detailed 3D nonlinear finite element models in Ansys Autodyn. The accuracy of the finite element model proposed was verified using available experimental test data of a similar steel sandwich panel tested. The results show the developed finite element model can be reliably used to simulate the nonlinear behaviour of the steel sandwich panels under free air blast loads. The verified finite element model was used to examine the different parameters of the steel sandwich panel with different core materials. The result shows that the sandwich panel with RPF core material is more efficient than the VR sandwich panel followed by the Hollow sandwich panels. The average maximum displacement of RPF sandwich panel under different ranges of TNT charge (1 kg to 10 kg at a standoff distance of 1 m) is 49% and 53% less than the VR and Hollow sandwich panels, respectively. Detailed empirical design equations were provided to quantify the maximum deformation of the steel sandwich panels with different core materials and core thickness under a different range of blast loads. The developed equations can be used as a guide for engineer to design steel sandwich panels with RPF and VR core material under a different range of free air blast loads.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.65 no.5
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• pp.587-600
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• 2018

Infill panel is the first element of a building subjected to blast loading activating its out-of-plane behavior. If the infill panel does not have enough ductility against the loading, it breaks and gets damaged before load transfer and energy dissipation. As steel infill panel has appropriate ductility before fracture, it can be used as an alternative to typical infill panels under blast loading. Also, it plays a pivotal role in maintaining sensitive main parts against blast loading. Concerning enough ductility of the infill panel out-of-plane behavior, the impact force enters the horizontal diaphragm and is distributed among the lateral elements. This article investigates the behavior of steel infill panels with different thicknesses and stiffeners. In order to precisely study steel infill panels, different ranges of blast loading are used and maximum displacement of steel infill under such various blast loading is studied. In this research, finite element analyses including geometric and material nonlinearities are used for optimization of the steel plate thickness and stiffener arrangement to obtain more efficient design for its better out-of-plane behavior. The results indicate that this type of infill with out-of-plane behavior shows a proper ductility especially in severe blast loadings. In the blasts with high intensity, maximum displacement of infill is more sensitive to change in the thickness of plate rather the change in number of stiffeners such that increasing the number of stiffeners and the plate thickness of infill panel would decrease energy dissipation by 20 and 77% respectively. The ductile behavior of steel infill panels shows that using infill panels with less thickness has more effect on energy dissipation. According to this study, the infill panel with 5 mm thickness works better if the criterion of steel infill panel design is the reduction of transmitted impulse to main structure. For example in steel infill panels with 5 stiffeners and blast loading with the reflected pressure of 375 kPa and duration of 50 milliseconds, the transmitted impulse has decreased from 41206 N.Sec in 20 mm infill to 37898 N.Sec in 5 mm infill panel.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Geothermal and Hydrothermal Energy
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.79-90
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• 2021

This paper presents a study to reduce the effect of blast pressure on the blast valves installed in protection tunnels, where the shape of the tunnel entrance and the blast pocket is optimized based on the predetermined basic shape of the protective tunnels. The reliability of the numerical tunnel models was examined by performing analyses of mesh convergence and overpressure stability and with comparison to the data in blast-load design charts in UFC 3-340-02 (DoD, 2008). An optimal mesh size and a stabilized distance of overpressure were proposed, and the numerical results were validated based on the UFC data. A parametric study to reduce the blast overpressures in tunnel was conducted using the validated numerical model. Analysis was performed applying 1) the entrance slope of 90, 75, 60, and 45 degrees, 2) two blast pockets with the depth 0.5, 1.0, and 1.5 times the tunnel width, 3) the three types of curved back walls of the blast pockets, and 4) two types of the upper and lower surfaces of the blast pockets to the reference tunnel model. An optimal solution by combining the analysis results of the tunnel entrance shape, the depth of the blast pockets, and the upper and lower parts of the blast pockets was provided in comparison to the reference tunnel model. The blast overpressures using the proposed tunnel shape have been reduced effectively.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2005.05a
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• pp.772-775
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• 2005

Most engineers, related to soil and civil dynamic field, have been interested in the direct dynamic design of building transmitted from soil and rock to structure due to blasting. However it is not easy to estimate the dynamic response of structures due to blasting by using analytical method because of difficulties of soil modeling, prediction of excitation force and so on. In this paper, dynamic analysis have been performed to predict vibration level and evaluate dynamic safety of structure adjacent to tunnel blast and the semi empirical method, which is based on vibration measurement data, has been employed to consider blast vibration characteristics.

• Explosives and Blasting
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.7-14
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• 2008

In order to complete successfully the demolition of a silo structure by means of felling method, structural properties and the geometric design of blast mouth have to be considered. In this study, a commercial software, 3-dimensional applied element analysis (3D AEM), was used to investigate the effect of the geometrical parameters of blast mouth on the collapse behavior of the silo structure.

• Explosives and Blasting
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.18-22
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• 2014

KoRail establishes "Guideline for earthquake acceleration measuring instrument and operation." and applies the management of the rapid transit railroad. KoRail manages the trains by train driving patterns subjected to the train operating know-how for the safety against the earthquake hazards. This paper introduces the case studies on bench blast and tunnel blast designs considering a rapid transit railroad.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.75-85
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• 2003

Laboratory model blast and in-situ rock blast tests were conducted to determine blast-induced stress wave propagation characteristics under different explosive types, different loading conditions and different mediums. Dynamic numerical approaches were conducted under the same conditions as experimental tests. Stress magnitudes at mid-point between two blast holes which were detonated simultaneously increased up to two times those of single hole detonation. The rise time of maximum stress in a decoupled charge condition was delayed two times that of a fully charged condition. Dynamic numerical analysis showed almost similar results to blast test results, which verifies the effectiveness of numerical approaches fur optimizing the tunnel blast design. Dynamic numerical analysis was executed to evaluate rock behavior and damage of the contour hole, the sloping hole adjacent to the contour hole in the road tunnel blasting pattern. The rock damage zone of the sloping hole from the numerical analysis was larger than that of the contour hole. Damage in the sloping hole can be reduced by using lower density explosive, by applying decoupled charge, or by increasing distance between the sloping hole and the contour hole.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.421-438
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• 2016

Explosions inside transportation tunnels might result in failure of tunnel structures. This study investigated the failure mechanisms of circular cast-iron tunnels in saturated soil subjected to medium internal blast loading. This issue is crucial to tunnel safety as many transportation tunnels run through saturated soils. At the same time blast loading on saturated soils may induce residual excess pore pressure, which may result in soil liquefaction. A series of numerical simulations were carried out using Finite Element program LS-DYNA. The effect of soil liquefaction was simulated by the Federal Highway soil model. It was found that the failure modes of tunnel lining were differed with different levels of blast loading. The damage and failure of the tunnel lining was progressive in nature and they occurred mainly during lining vibration when the main event of blast loading was over. Soil liquefaction may lead to more severe failure of tunnel lining. Soil deformation and soil liquefaction were determined by the coupling effects of lining damage, lining vibration, and blast loading. The damage of tunnel lining was a result of internal blast loading as well as dynamic interaction between tunnel lining and saturated soil, and stress concentration induced by a ventilation shaft connected to the tunnel might result in more severe lining damage.

• Coupled systems mechanics
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.167-181
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• 2023

The determination of the blast protection level and the corresponding minimum load-bearing capacity for a laminated glass (LG) window is of crucial importance for safety and security design purposes. In this paper, the focus is given to the window response under near-field blast loading, i.e., where relatively small explosives would be activated close to the target, representative of attack scenarios using small commercial drones. In general, the assessment of the load-bearing capacity of a window is based on complex and expensive experiments, which can be conducted for a small number of configurations. On the other hand, nowadays, validated numerical simulations tools based on the Finite Element Method (FEM) are available to partially substitute the physical tests for the assessment of the performance of various LG systems, especially for the far-field blast loading. However, very little literature is available on the LG window performance under near-field blast loads, which differs from far-field situations in two points: i) the duration of the load is very short, since the blast wavelength tends to increase with the distance and ii) the load distribution is not uniform over the window surface, as opposed to the almost plane wave configuration for far-field configurations. Therefore, the current study focuses on the performance assessment and structural behaviour of LG windows under near-field blasts. Typical behavioural trends are investigated, by taking into account possible relevant damage mechanisms in the LG window components, while size effects for target LG windows are also addressed under a multitude of blast loading configurations.