Impact of tsunami forces on structures the university of Ottawa experience

Over the past seven years, a comprehensive interdisciplinary research program has been conducted between researchers at the University of Ottawa and at the Canadian Hydraulics Centre (CHC) of the National Research Council of Canada. The objectives of this on-going research program are to identify and quantify forces that are imposed on near-shoreline structures when exposed to tsunamiinduced hydraulic bores and to investigate mitigation strategies to dampen these forces. The experimental component of this research program involves two structural models (square and circular) that are tested in the High Discharge Flume at CHC. The structural models are instrumented to record base shear force-, base overturning moment-, pressure-, acceleration-, lateral displacement- and bore depth-time histories continually during testing. Impact loading resulting from wood debris of different sizes and located at pre-determined distances from the structural models is also studied. Furthermore, this research program aims to review tsunami-induced forces on structures prescribed by recent design documents.Peer reviewed: YesNRC publication: Ye