Seismic Assessment and Retrofitting of an Historical Masonry Building Damaged during the 2016 Centro Italia Seismic Event

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

In this paper, a work is presented on the study of the seismic assessment of an historical masonry building hit by a seismic event in 2016. The work is very complete since it integrates post-earthquake survey and different numerical strategies for the assessment: from kinematic limit analysis and equivalent frame method to a FE-based analysis. The effect of different retrofitting techniques was evaluated in order to guarantee a seismic performance requirement.

The paper is well structured and generally well written. The subject of investigation is important to the technical community, especially because it can be directly used by engineering practitioners with similar case studies. The reviewer thus believes that after reviewing the minor comments given as follows, the paper can be accepted for publication.

1.    Abstract: Line 10. In the first line of the abstract, please remove “of” after “preservation”.

2.    Abstract: Line 12. Replace “realized” by ”constructed”.

3.    Figure 1: Perhaps it can be better arranged to be able to fit in the same row.

4.    Figure 2. It would be very convenient to have an idea of the inspection window dimension. Please insert the squared window dimension in the legend.

5.    Lines 88-92: Here, perhaps authors can enrich the EFM methods literature with the SLAMA method applied to masonry structures (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jobe.2022.105487).

6.    Line 67: It is unclear if authors want to refer to the EFM rather than the FEM model. Additionally, more information on the FE modelling must be given. The reviewer suggests that a brief paragraph should be added to explain the modelling strategy adopted for the FE model.

7.    Figure 6 and Figure 11: please add a legend with indication of the red and green curves.

8.    Please replace in the text “cross-lam” by “cross-laminated”.

9.    Line 297: in order to better justify the modelling assumption of using springs to represent the interface, authors can refer to a literature study. For instance, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.engstruct.2021.112683

10.             Table 8 and 9: please use the same number of decimal cases. Review in other tables.

11. Section 3.2 is currently long. Perhaps authors can divide this section in two. For instance: ”3.2 Retrofitted configuration: intervention on masonry walls” and ”3.3. Retrofitted configuration: intervention on the roof structure”.

12. Line 301-302; 305-307, 311-312. To improve the reading flow, perhaps these sentences can be merged.

13. Please comment how damping was considered for the time-history analysis. Rayleigh damping? And the assumed value. This can be of great importance for those who have similar case studies.

Author Response

The authors would like to express their gratitude to the reviewer for her/his help in improving the manuscript. Replies to reviewer are reported in the the attached file. In the revised version of manuscript, all changes are highlighted in yellow. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

In this study, the authors performed a case study and focused on the structural rehabilitation of an historical masonry building hit by the strong 2016 Centro Italia seismic event. Starting from the post-earthquake survey, 3D finite elements models of the current configuration have been implemented using an equivalent frame approach in order to evaluate the seismic vulnerability of the building. Moreover, a kinematic analysis has been performed to detect the possible activation of the local collapse mechanisms. The results have shown that the building was afflicted by a high vulnerability under seismic action. Therefore, different retrofitting interventions have been studied to improve the seismic response of the construction. In general, the contents are interesting and well written, but a few questions are required to be well handled before publication.

1. The authors performed the seismic retrofitting of existing buildings, which is a great work. The introduction section can be further improved to the literature, and the reviewer suggests to focus more on the short comings of the existing references. The following papers related can be included into the Intro and contents. 10.1016/j.jobe.2022.103988; 10.1002/eqe.600; 10.1016/j.jobe.2022.104904.

2. How to determine the earthquakes in the nonlinear time history analysis? For example, commonly a comparison with the target spectrum is needed.

3. In the modelling section, the details of the modelling strategies (e.g., elements, materials, fiber sections) should be further enhanced. Mostly importantly, a comparison with the experimental data or related data may be needed to verify the accuracy of the numerical model.

4. It seems the authors only consider the displacement as the index for the seismic retrofitting assessment in this case study. Maybe some other indexes (e.g., force index, damage index, energy index) can also be discussed, or at least be mentioned in the analysis for explanation.

5. In the conclusion, the meaning of this paper should be further enhanced, e.g., the retrofitting design strategy and retrofitting design suggestions of the local buildings for the readers and future study, according to the case study of this paper?

Author Response

The authors would like to express their gratitude to the reviewer for her/his help in improving the manuscript. Replies to reviewer are reported in the the attached file. In the revised version of manuscript, all changes are highlighted in yellow. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf