Seismic loss estimations for buildings in Dallas-Fort Worth region

The recent increase in the number of earthquakes in Texas has raised concerns about the region's buildings and infrastructure. Due to the historically low natural seismicity in the area, many buildings are built without considering seismic design and detailing specifications, which is causing more concern. This thesis seeks to establish a process for conducting seismic risk assessments and economic loss estimations for the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) metropolitan area in Texas. For defined earthquake scenarios in the area, this research examines the level of building damage and related direct economic losses. A loss assessment is conducted for a few scenario earthquakes for the DFW area, and the regional damage and economic losses are estimated. HAZUS fragility curves are used for various types of buildings and seismic design classifications to understand seismic vulnerability of building structures. All of the input data, including the building inventory dataset, seismic hazard and shaking map, fragility curves, and damage assessment equations to estimate economic losses are implemented in the ShakeRisk software, and economic losses are estimated according to this damage assessment framework. The findings show that seismic events of small to moderate magnitude have the potential to cause major economic losses in the DFW area. The findings of the seismic risk assessment will aid decision-makers in predicting and planning for the probable damages and economic losses from potential earthquakes in the area.