- Author
- Minciarelli, F. | Gioffre, M. | Grigoriu, M. | Simiu, E.
- Title
- Estimates of Extreme Wind Effects and Wind Load Factors: Influence of Knowledge Uncertainties.
- Coporate
- University of Perugia, Italy Cornell Univ., Ithaca, NY National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD
- Journal
- Probabilistic Engineering Mechanics, Vol. 16, No. 4, 331-340, 2001
- Keywords
- wind effects | chaotic resonance | hopping rates | signal-to-noise ratio | hurricanes | load factors | Monte Carlo simulation | reliability | structural engineering
- Abstract
- We propose a probabilistic methodology for developing improved estimates of extreme wind effects and load factors in standard provisions for wind loads. We obtained the following results: (1) the discrepancy between current estimates of safety indices for gravity and wind loads is an artifact that can be removed by using current knowledge on probability distributions of extreme wind speeds; (2) the disregard in the ASCE 7-98 Standard of (a)knowledge uncertainties, and (b) errors inherent in the limited number of climatological data on which hurricane wind speed simulations are based, leads to incorrect wind load factor estimates for hurricane-prone regions; and (3) increasing beyond 30 min the length of pressure records used for the estimation of fluctuation peaks appears to have a relatively small effect on estimates of overall wind effects.