Earthquake Control using Geographical Information and Building Damage-Estimation Models

Natural disasters are the consequences that result from natural processes, and they include hurricanes, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, landslides, floods, other geological processes and human activities. To reduce the effect of such disasters, governments formulate an effective system, i.e. disaster management. The available data from infrastructures, lifeline systems, roads, health clinics etc. helps the management to provide better decision making. In this regard, the role of Geographical Information System (GIS) is vital to collect, stow, analyze, model and present a bulk data quantity. The present case study based on Chennai summarizes several steps to develop a web-based GIS that manages and responds to earthquakes. A key problem to implement this sort of system is the unavailability of a specific model to evaluate the extent of damages occurred soon after the occurrence of earthquakes. This work intends to construct a Building Damage-Estimation Model (BDEM) for the optimization of the response period and loss occurring due to earthquakes. It also introduces energy dissipation and active control devices to build earthquake-resistant structures