Paper
Post-Failure Analysis of the Glazing Systems Subjected to Air Blast
- Authors:
- Hossein Ataei; James C. Anderson
- Abstract
- Glass fragments are a prime source of injury to the occupants of buildings during an explosion. Therefore, a better understanding of the post-failure response to these glass panels to the various glazing system parameters and blast load characteristics is an important step in mitigating the blast-related glass fragments injuries. A successful blast-resistant glazing design requires balancing of the safety and security of the window panels with physical appearance and cost-effectiveness to provide a reasonable degree of protection against explosive threats. In this paper, the blast-induced properties of glass fragments for the proposed glazing systems are calculated by application of the Simplified Techniques, Empirical Approaches and the Explicit Finite Element Simulations in order to find the post-failure characteristics of the flying glass debris including the fragment flying velocities; number of generated fragments and their flying distances. The results of the hazard level assessment indicate that for conventional glazing systems, the glass debris characteristics (velocities; distances and fragment numbers) will be consistent through the application of the Simplified, Empirical and Finite Element Methods. Although Simplified and Empirical approaches provide faster practical answers, Finite Element solutions render the results that are more accurate and better representative of the glazing system parameters because of taking into account the glass panel characteristics. These results could be used towards the development of more comprehensive blast-resistant glazing injury models to improve the safety provisions for the building occupants during an air blast.
- Keywords
- Glazing Systems; Air Blast; Security and Safety; Flying Glass Debris; Hazard Assessment
- StartPage
- 209
- EndPage
- 218
- Doi