Masonry Magazine October 1995 Page. 17
Glass Block Holds Up to Earthquake
Glass block in more than a score of buildings in and near the epicenter of the 1994 Northridge, California earthquake -- including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art -- suffered little or no damage.
By GARY C. HART
Hart Consultant Group
The Northridge earthquake occurred at 4:31 a.m. local time on Monday, January 17, 1994. The epicenter of the earthquake was very near the Los Angeles suburb of Northridge. Glass Block panels performed very well during the earthquake in contrast to many other types of structures and structural systems. For example, attributed to the earthquake was a total of 58 deaths and about 1,500 people admitted to hospitals with major injuries. It's estimated that between 80,000 and 125,000 people were temporarily or permanently displaced and over 400,000 people registered for various types of federal disaster assistance.
This Richter magnitude 6.8 earthquake was the largest earthquake in the United States to have its epicenter in an urban area. Therefore, this earthquake presented an excellent opportunity to observe the performance of glass block panels that were designed and constructed in accordance with the provisions of the Uniform Building Code (UBC). The intensity of ground shaking of earthquake motion at a building site can be quantified as the force per unit weight that the ground imparts on the building and its contents. The units of this force per unit weight are called "g's" and we refer to this earthquake force as the "g-force" with which the earthquake pushes on the building and its glass block panel systems. If the g-force pushes with a magnitude that is greater than the strength of the building or the glass block panels, then the building or glass block Continued on Page 43