Thesis Defense - Züleyha Kanpara Cıvaş (MSCE)

Züleyha Kanpara Cıvaş - M.Sc.

Asst. Prof. Taner Yılmaz – Advisor

Date: 26.08.2020

Time: 13:00

Location: This meeting will be held ONLINE. Please send an e-mail to gizem.bakir@ozyegin.edu.tr  to participate in this defense.

Fragility Assessment of River-Crossing Highway Bridges under Flood-Induced Loads and Scour

Thesis Committee:

Asst.Prof. Taner Yılmaz,  Özyeğin University

Asst.Prof. Derya Deniz,  Özyeğin University

Professor Alp Caner, Middle East Technical University

Abstract:

Flood hazard is a major threat to the safety and serviceability of transportation infrastructure systems causing a sudden loss of life and property. High levels of discharge values occurring in flood events may produce excessive scour and accumulations of debris around the piers of river-crossing highway bridges. The hydrodynamic loading induced by the increased flow velocities can cause damage and even collapse of the bridges with the increase in lateral displacement response and the reduction in the lateral resistance at the pier foundations due to scour. In the meantime, the accumulation of debris can aggravate the scour depths and enhance the drag force acting on the piers. Although flood-induced scour is one of the most common causes of past bridge failures, still there is a lack of structural risk assessment methodologies to address this issue. 

The thesis study aims to evaluate the vulnerability of river-crossing highway bridges subjected to flood-induced loads and scour through the generation of fragility curves. For this purpose, firstly a sensitivity analysis is conducted to identify the key modeling parameters affecting the bridge response under flood effects. Then, a simulation-based probabilistic framework is developed to produce the flood fragility curves in the absence and presence of debris accumulation. Within the applied methodology, finite element models of a bridge bent are generated and nonlinear analyses are performed under the applied flood-induced load and scour effects to compute the bridge structural response. It is found out that bridge failure probabilities are significantly increased due to the presence of debris accumulation. The fragility curves generated in this thesis can be used in future studies on risk assessment of highway bridges under flood hazards.

Short-Bio: 

Züleyha Kanpara Cıvaş received her bachelor's degree from the Civil Engineering Department at Izmir Institute of Technology in 2017. She has been working as a teaching assistant at Özyeğin University since 2018.

---------------

Kişisel Verilerin Korunması/Aydınlatma Metni

Özyeğin Üniversitesi Fen Bilimleri Enstitüsü bünyesindeki programlarda, izleyici olarak katılınan online platformlarda gerçekleştirilen aleni akademik faaliyetlerin sadece idari ve yasal yükümlülüklerin yerine getirilmesi amacıyla kayıt altına alındığı, söz konusu kayıt ile elde edilen kişisel verilerin ilgililer tarafından başka bir amaçla kullanılamayacağı hususunda şahsınızı aydınlatır, toplantıya gönüllü katılım ile bu hususu beyan ve taahhüt etmiş olduğunuzu belirtir, gereğini önemle rica ederiz. 

Fen Bilimleri Enstitüsü