Seismic performance of RC buildings during the M_W7.8 Muisne (Ecuador) earthquake on April 2016: field observations and case study

The M_w = 7.8 Muisne event of April 16, 2016 occurred on Saturday at 18:58:37 local time off-shore of the west coast of northern Ecuador. Several cities in the province of Manabí were directly affected and a state of emergency was declared in six provinces encompassing a total area of 70,000 km². The building stock was severely damaged. 80% of the buildings were destroyed in the city of Pedernales, while several multi-storey reinforced concrete structures totally collapsed in the cities of Manta and Portoviejo. Field observations on the seismic performance of reinforced concrete buildings inspected by the authors are presented in this paper. Also, numerical results from three-dimensional pushover analysis of a representative case study building are discussed. The effect of corrosion and masonry infills, which played a key role in the observed damage, was directly taken into account in the analytical model.