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Open source software to analyze and design buildings
Do you feel prepared for the next earthquake? I don't want to be an alarmist but as a PhD in Earthquake Engineering i
know this is a very real problem for the residents of Kathmandu, which
now includes myself. In times if crisis it's always the better prepared
that survive - how prepared do you feel?
The very first thing we need to do in Nepal is to start constructing buildings and retrofit existing structures to be safe against Earthquakes - a very large percentage of existing buildings are not and it will be a catastrophe of epic proportions when an EQ strikes. We have to do 3 things (a) retrofit existing buildings to be life safe (b) construct new buildings with better standards and (c) prepare for the worst between (a) and (b) as life goes on for ordinary Nepalis. What saddens me is that all the embassy people I meet and wealthy people here insist (with good reason) that their buildings meet standards for life safety against an earthquake. If we have a relatively big EQ tomorrow it will be just like Katrina where the majority people who die will be poor and the ones that make it will be the small proportion of the population who are wealthy or educated.
Life safety should be an absolute minimum standard for buildings that house people as it is in developed countries. What's tragic is that it's actually not very difficult or expensive construct a building in a manner that does not kill it's occupants (it's much harder and expensive to make it fully operational after an EQ). Let's shrug off our habit of saying "ke garne" and understand something - a devastating earthquake WILL happen, it's just a matter of when and more importantly there's many things we can ALL do, regardless of income, to increase of our chances of surviving. People who are most prepared always have the greatest chance of surviving disasters - read this article. Think. Prepare. Act.
The good news is that a lot of life saving measures are actually very inexpensive. The second piece of good news is that you can get the very best structural analysis software for free. I've been to a few structural engineering firms here in Kathmandu who are using outdated and expensive software. Berkeley has an excellent open source software initiative that's very mature where you can download the best earthquake analysis program. Before you can design a building properly you first have to analyze it correctly - get the best analysis software money can't buy (it's free) here - http://opensees.berkeley.edu/OpenSees/user/download.php
It's free and open source - so not only can you download if for free right now, you can also do mashups to do whatever you want with the analysis engine. For example I used it to measure force feedback and deformations for a haptics project where using a robotic arm you could prod an object on a computer screen and see and feel the object react to you - basically simulating touch.
To make things even easier you can follow this link to - http://ocw.mit.edu/ans7870/1/1.050/java/frameworks/. It's a structural analysis program I wrote that has an easy graphical user interface. Pick steel sections, load your structure, and measure deformations. Easy peasy. I even wrote a "how to" guide and the source code (java) can be downloaded here.
The very first thing we need to do in Nepal is to start constructing buildings and retrofit existing structures to be safe against Earthquakes - a very large percentage of existing buildings are not and it will be a catastrophe of epic proportions when an EQ strikes. We have to do 3 things (a) retrofit existing buildings to be life safe (b) construct new buildings with better standards and (c) prepare for the worst between (a) and (b) as life goes on for ordinary Nepalis. What saddens me is that all the embassy people I meet and wealthy people here insist (with good reason) that their buildings meet standards for life safety against an earthquake. If we have a relatively big EQ tomorrow it will be just like Katrina where the majority people who die will be poor and the ones that make it will be the small proportion of the population who are wealthy or educated.
Life safety should be an absolute minimum standard for buildings that house people as it is in developed countries. What's tragic is that it's actually not very difficult or expensive construct a building in a manner that does not kill it's occupants (it's much harder and expensive to make it fully operational after an EQ). Let's shrug off our habit of saying "ke garne" and understand something - a devastating earthquake WILL happen, it's just a matter of when and more importantly there's many things we can ALL do, regardless of income, to increase of our chances of surviving. People who are most prepared always have the greatest chance of surviving disasters - read this article. Think. Prepare. Act.
The good news is that a lot of life saving measures are actually very inexpensive. The second piece of good news is that you can get the very best structural analysis software for free. I've been to a few structural engineering firms here in Kathmandu who are using outdated and expensive software. Berkeley has an excellent open source software initiative that's very mature where you can download the best earthquake analysis program. Before you can design a building properly you first have to analyze it correctly - get the best analysis software money can't buy (it's free) here - http://opensees.berkeley.edu/OpenSees/user/download.php
It's free and open source - so not only can you download if for free right now, you can also do mashups to do whatever you want with the analysis engine. For example I used it to measure force feedback and deformations for a haptics project where using a robotic arm you could prod an object on a computer screen and see and feel the object react to you - basically simulating touch.
To make things even easier you can follow this link to - http://ocw.mit.edu/ans7870/1/1.050/java/frameworks/. It's a structural analysis program I wrote that has an easy graphical user interface. Pick steel sections, load your structure, and measure deformations. Easy peasy. I even wrote a "how to" guide and the source code (java) can be downloaded here.
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