Theoretical assessment of progressive collapse capacity of reinforced concrete structures

The progressive collapse behaviour of reinforced concrete (RC) structures requires consideration of material andgeometric non-linearity, concrete crushing and rebar fracture. Compressive arch action (CAA) and catenary action(CTA) are the main resisting mechanisms against progressive collapse following a column loss. Hence, many studieshave concentrated on the development of CAA and CTA in RC beams, but without considering the effect of barfracture and the reduction in beam effective depth due to concrete crushing. Taking these additional factors intoaccount, an analytical model to predict the structural behaviour of RC beams under a column removal scenario wasdeveloped. The proposed model was evaluated and validated with the available experimental results. The evaluationand validation indicate that the proposed model can provide a reliable assessment of RC beam capacity againstprogressive collapse