Structural health assessment of bridge

Abstract

The aging of structures subjected to adverse environmental conditions, earthquake, heavy wind load, mechanical vibration, fatigue, flutter effects and accident etc may lead to damage in the structure. The damage generally begins at the material level and under a particular loading scenario it progresses to component and system level. If the existence of damage in unmonitored and unnoticed, it will lead to undesirable stresses or deformations. This will affect the present or future performance of the structure leading to functional problems and ultimately a catastrophic failure. Hence, the early assessment of structural damage is one of the major challenges in existing bridges. In India, most infrastructure are aged and are still being used despite the deterioration and associated damage. Moreover, the structures are being subjected to earthquakes, bomb blast, mechanical vibrations, and operational fatigue conditions. In such cases, conditions monitoring of these structures is an area of prime concern. The structure under such conditions are to be immediately evaluated and precautionary measures needs to be implemented to avoid catastrophic failures and minimise the down time. The failure of Civil Engineering structures like bridges, buildings etc., More often results in a large number of causalities as well as social and economic problems. Hence, the health monitoring of a structure is an emerging research field to provide a potential to assess the safety and integrity of structures.