Observations of Wellington Earthquake Damage

This project captures earthquake damage to building envelopes due to seismic activity in New Zealand. Two cities central business districts were targeted; Christchurch following the 2010-2011 earthquakes, and Wellington following the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake. A total of 247 photographs for Christchurch and 1491 for Wellington were taken to establish the common failure types associated with the earthquakes and building types used in New Zealand. The findings showed that three types of failures were prevalent: window gasket dislodgement, glazing cracking, and glazing dislodgement. The three failures are found on the glazing systems that are common to all building envelopes and this provided a commonality when comparing envelopes of different kinds, on different superstructures, and in different regions of the country. The findings were used to develop a seismic testing protocol for the non-structural component (building envelopes), and to aid in developing a design prediction tool to predict seismic-related damage to the envelopes.