CAEE Seminar – Large-Scale Experimentation Using the NSF NHERI Wall of Wind Experimental Facility to Assess and Mitigate Hurricane Wind and Rain Impacts on Buildings and Infrastructure Systems
Prof. Paul Anderson, Prof. Jamshid Mohammadi, and Prof. Brent Stephens of the Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering department will be hosting a seminar featuring Dr. Ioannis Zisis, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Florida International University. The seminar's topic will be Large-Scale Experimentation Using the NSF NHERI Wall of Wind Experimental Facility to Assess and Mitigate Hurricane Wind and Rain Impacts on Buildings and Infrastructure Systems.
Abstract
Wind-induced effects on buildings and infrastructure located in coastal areas of the USA and around the globe have caused damages worth billions of dollars. To develop wind damage mitigation techniques and conduct research on various wind engineering topics, a state-of-the-art large-scale experimental facility -- the Wall of Wind (WOW) -- was developed at Florida International University (FIU), Miami, USA. This facility includes a 12-fan boundary layer wind tunnel that can generate wind speeds of 157 mph (70 m/s), equivalent to a Category 5 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale. This facility has been used for various applications: assessing wind loads on buildings, bridges, and traffic signals; simulating wind-driven rain (WDR) intrusion in buildings; and assessing the capability of a building or its components to withstand high wind speeds. Due to its significant contributions to the wind engineering community, the WOW has been designated as an “Experimental Facility” (EF) under the Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) program of the National Science Foundation (NSF), USA. This talk describes the capabilities, uniqueness, and resources at the 12-fan WOW EF. Information will be provided about the services provided by the EF staff to the facility users and how to explore opportunities to utilize the NHERI WOW EF for NSF proposals on natural hazards mitigation research. User Workshop and Webinar opportunities will be highlighted. A “Testing Enhancement Program”™ will be discussed to illustrate the opportunity available to researchers with active NSF projects interested in performing WOW EF testing to complement their current research projects and/or validate their numerical simulations at no cost. WOW EF case studies will be presented on estimating wind loads on various buildings and infrastructure systems, and recently funded NSF projects will be briefly discussed. The development of innovative mitigation strategies will be described. Finally, research opportunities at the WOW EF, collaborative prospects, and fellowships/assistantships for qualified graduate students will be highlighted.
Speaker Bio
Ioannis Zisis is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Department and a member of the International Hurricane Research Center (IHRC) Laboratory for Wind Engineering Research and Wall of Wind research group at Florida International University.
Dr. Zisis has studied wind effects on the built environment for over 10 years. His research focus is structural and environmental wind engineering. He has used advanced experimental methods, including wind tunnel and full-scale monitoring techniques, to examine how residential and other structures react to extreme wind events. The outcomes of his research efforts are aimed at developing and improving national and international wind standards and building codes of practice. Dr. Zisis has over 60 publications in international journals and conference proceedings, and he is a member of the Structural Wind Engineering Committee (SWEC) and Environmental Wind Engineering Committee (EWEC) of the Technical Council on Wind Engineering and the American Society of Civil Engineers (TCWE-ASCE). He is also the NSF-supported Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) Wall of Wind Experimental Facility.