Building damage caused by devastating earthquakes in Croatia in 2020

The paper will present the basic characteristics of the earthquakes that hit Croatia in 2020 from a structural engineering point of view. Characteristic damage to typical buildings in the affected regions will be shown depending on the magnitude of the earthquake. Numerous examples will provide an overview of the causes of damage to structural and non-structural elements. The impact of earthquakes of different magnitudes on the response of buildings will be compared.
In the paper, the mechanisms of collapse of masonry buildings depending on the existence of diaphragms and their connection to the walls will be described. Also, observed extension of damage will be compared to that expected damage level for earthquakes of this magnitude.
Finally, conclusions will be given about the causes of the damage and the measures that need to be taken to prevent them in the future. Special attention will be given to the load bearing capacity and ductility of masonry buildings, their ability to dissipate energy and the failure mechanisms that are crucial for damage of buildings.
Short Bio :
Mario Uroš was born in 1982 in Dubrovnik. He studied at the Faculty of Civil Engineering in Zagreb, where he graduated in 2006 in the field of structural engineering. Now, he works at the Faculty of Civil Engineering, University of Zagreb as an Associate Professor at the Department of Engineering Mechanics, Chair for Statics, Dynamics and Stability of Structures. He is actively involved in teaching of the university undergraduate and graduate programs at the in courses Mechanics II and Theory of Stability.
In his scientific work he works in the wider field of numerical modeling, dynamics and stability of structures and earthquake engineering. He participates in the many scientific project in his field of research as a participant or leader. He is a member of the organizing and scientific committee of several scientific and professional international conferences and author of many relevant scientific and professional papers.
He was involved in the implementation of European projects MATILDA for damage assessment and emergency measures after earthquakes and Interreg READINESS project in which he performs numerical calculations for buildings of strategic interest in the City of Dubrovnik and Split-Dalmatia County in case of a possible earthquake, in cooperation with the Faculty of Civil Engineering and the Faculty of Science. As a member of the working group of the Faculty of Civil Engineering, which was the main contractor in cooperation with DUZS and MGIPU during 2018, he worked on the preparation of the Updated Disaster Risk Assessment for the Republic of Croatia - earthquake risk assessment. He is a member of the team for the preparation of the Earthquake Remediation Study, which has been conducted for the City of Zagreb since 2012, and in 2018 he was the leader of the team. He was a member of the Croatian team for post-earthquake damage assessment, mobilized through Civil Protection of the Ministry of the Interior, on the mission in Albania after the earthquake in 2019. He is currently the head of the Establishment Research Project of the Croatian Science Foundation "New vulnerability models of typical buildings in urban areas: applications in seismic risk assessment and target retrofit methodology"
He is a member of the subcommittee HZN/TO 548/PO 8, Construction Eurocodes; Eurocode 8, Design of seismic resistance of structures in the Croatian Standards Institute. He is a member of the editorial board of the scientific journal Građevinar and is a reviewer for several scientific journals. Since 2011 he has been a member of the Croatian Chamber of Civil Engineers. He has been one of the coordinators of rapid damage assessments of buildings by civil engineers after the earthquakes in Zagreb in March 2020 and Petrinja in December 2020 and a series of necessary community relief activities. He has won several awards, including the Medal of the City of Zagreb and the award of the Croatian Chamber of Civil Engineers "Kolos" in 2020 for his contribution to post-earthquake activities.