Influence of seismicity level and height of the building on progressive collapse resistance of steel frames

Influences of building height and seismicity level on progressive collapse resistance of buildings are investigated in this paper. For the height, 4-story, 8-story and 12-story steel special moment resisting frames are focused. The obtained results indicate that taller buildings are safer against progressive collapse. To study the influence of seismicity level, different four-story structures having special moment resisting frame systems are designed for different levels of seismicity, namely, very high, high, moderate and low. The structures are evaluated, using nonlinear dynamic method and two main scenarios of the codes, including sudden removal of a corner and a middle column in the first floor. Some graphs are presented for progressive collapse resistance of the structures, depending on their seismic base shears. It is shown that the structures designed for greater seismic base shears are more resistant against progressive collapse. Copyright (C) 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.