• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.23 no.10
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• pp.1673-1691
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• 2014

Although most natural disaster related studies conducted in Korea recently have been related to typhoons or severe rainstorms, the occurrence frequency of disasters due to windstorms or rainstorms is also high. To reduce the strong wind damage caused by strong windstorms due to climate change, basic studies of strong winds are necessary. Therefore, in this study, the types and representative cases of windstorms that were observed to have been higher than 14 m/s, which is the criterion for strong-wind warnings from the Korea Meteorological Administration, were selected from among those windstorm cases that occurred on the Korean Peninsula for 10 years to conduct a statistical analysis of them and determine their synoptic meteorological characteristics. The cases of windstorms occurring on the Korean Peninsula were divided into six weather patterns according to the locations of the anticyclones/cyclones. Among these types, the SH type, which occurs when Siberian Highs expand into the Korean Peninsula, showed the highest occurrence frequency, accounting for at least the majority of the entire occurrence frequency of windstorms together with that of the EC type, which occurs when cyclones develop on the East Sea, and there was no clear yearly trend of the occurrence frequencies of windstorms. The monthly occurrence frequencies of windstorms were formed mainly by typhoons in the summer and the Siberian Highs in the winter, and the months with the highest windstorm occurrence frequencies were December and January, in which mainly the SH and EC type windstorms occurred. March showed the next highest occurrence frequency with10 times, and SH windstorms occurred the most frequently in March, followed by the CC, SC, and EC types of windstorms, in order of precedence. Therefore, attention to these types of windstorms is required. Countermeasures against storm and flood damage in Korea targeting the summer should be re-reviewed together with pre-disaster prevention plans, because cases of storm and flood damage due to windstorms occur more frequently than those due to typhoons, and they occur throughout the year.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.165-183
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• 2022

Most transportation departments have recognized and developed procedures to address the ever-increasing weights of trucks traveling on bridges in a service today. Transportation agencies also recognize the issues with overheight vehicles' collisions with bridges, but few stakeholders have definitive countermeasures. Bridges are becoming more vulnerable to collisions from overheight vehicles. The exact response under lateral impact force is difficult to predict. In this paper, nonlinear impact analysis shows that the degree of deformation recorded through the modeling of the unprotected vehicle-girder model provides realistic results compared to the observation from the US-61 bridge overheight vehicle impact. The predicted displacements are 0.229 m, 0.161 m, and 0.271 m in the girder bottom flange (lateral), bottom flange (vertical), and web (lateral) deformations, respectively, due to a truck traveling at 112.65 km/h. With such large deformations, the integrity of an impacted bridge becomes jeopardized, which in most cases requires closing the bridge for safety reasons and a need for rehabilitation. We proposed different sacrificial cushion systems to dissipate the energy of an overheight vehicle impact. The goal was to design and tune a suitable energy absorbing system that can protect the bridge and possibly reduce stresses in the overheight vehicle, minimizing the consequences of an impact. A material representing a Sorbothane high impact rubber was chosen and modeled in ANSYS. Out of three sacrificial schemes, a sandwich system is the best in protecting both the bridge and the overheight vehicle. The mitigation system reduced the lateral deflection in the bottom flange by 89%. The system decreased the stresses in the bridge girder and the top portion of the vehicle by 82% and 25%, respectively. The results reveal the capability of the proposed sacrificial system as an effective mitigation system.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.369-383
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• 2012

Researchers have recently begun using high spatial resolution remote-sensing data, which are automatically captured and georeferenced, to assess damage following natural and man-made disasters, in addition to, or instead of employing the older methods of walking house-to-house for surveys, or photographing individual buildings from an airplane. This research establishes quantitative relationships between the damage states observed at ground-level, and those observed from space using high spatial resolution remote-sensing data, for windstorms, for individual site-built one- or two-family residences (FR12). "Degrees of Damage" (DOD) from the Enhanced Fujita (EF) Scale were determined for ground-based damage states; damage states were also assigned for remote-sensing imagery, using a modified version of Womble's Remote-Sensing (RS) Damage Scale. The preliminary developed model can be used to predict the ground-level damage state using remote-sensing imagery, which could significantly lessen the time and expense required to assess the damage following a windstorm.

• Proceedings of the Korean Environmental Sciences Society Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.177-184
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• 2003

Numerical simulation on marine wind and sea surface elevation was carried out using both three-dimensional hydrostatic and non-hydrostatic models and a simple oceanic model from 0900 LST, August 13 to 0900 LST, August 15, 1995. As daytime easterly meso-scale sea-breeze from the eastern sea penetrates Kangnung city in the center part as basin and goes up along the slope of Mt. Taegullyang in the west, it confronts synoptic-scale westerly wind blowing over the top of the mountain at the mid of the eastern slope and then the resultant wind produces an upper level westerly return flow toward the East Sea. In a narrow band of weak surface wind within 10km of the coastal sea, wind stress is generally small, less than l${\times}$10E-2 Pa and it reaches 2 ${\times}$ 10E-2 Pa to the 35 km. Positive wind stress curl of 15 $\times$ 10E-5Pa $m^{-1}$ still exists in the same band and corresponds to the ascent of 70 em from the sea level. This is due to the generation of northerly wind driven current with a speed of 11 m $S^{-1}$ along the coast under the influence of south-easterly wind and makes an intrusion of warm waters from the southern sea into the northern coast, such as the East Korea Warm Current. On the other hand, even if nighttime downslope windstorm of 14m/s associated with both mountain wind and land-breeze produces the development of internal gravity waves with a hydraulic jump motion of air near the coastal inland surface, the surface wind in the coastal sea is relatively moderate south-westerly wind, resulting in moderate wind stress. Negative wind stress curl in the coast causes the subsidence of the sea surface of 15 em along the coast and south-westerly coastal surface wind drives alongshore south-easterly wind driven current, opposite to the daytime one. Then, it causes the intrusion of cold waters like the North Korea Cold Current in the northern coastal sea into the narrow band of the southern coastal sea. However, the band of positive wind stress curl at the distance of 30km away from the coast toward further offshore area can also cause the uprising of sea waters and the intrusion of warm waters from the southern sea toward the northern sea (northerly wind driven current), resulting in a counter-clockwise wind driven current. These clockwise and counter-clockwise currents much induce the formation of low clouds containing fog and drizzle in the coastal region.

• Atmosphere
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.207-224
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• 2008

Severe downslope windstorms observed at Gangneung, Korea in the springtime during the last 30 years are studied to understand their generation mechanisms. 92 severe wind cases are selected for which the maximum instantaneous wind speeds exceed two standard deviation of total mean plus ($18.7ms^{-1}$). They are categorized into the three mechanisms (hydraulic jump, partial reflection, and critical-level reflection) proposed in previous studies based on the flow condition, which is calculated using the wind and temperature profile observed at one upstream rawinsonde station, Osan. Among the three, partial reflection is found to be the most frequent mechanism for the last 30 years (1976 - 2005). To understand the role of inversion in generating severe downslope windstorms, horizontal velocity perturbation was calculated analytically for the atmosphere with an inversion layer. It turned out that the intensity of downslope wind was increased by inversion layer of specific heights, which are well matched with the observations. For better understanding the generation mechanisms, two-dimensional numerical simulations are conducted for the 92 severe wind cases using the ARPS model. In most simulations, surface wind speed exceeds the value of the severe-wind criterion, and each simulated case can be explained by its own generation mechanism. However, in most simulations, the simulated surface wind speed is larger than the observed, due to ignoring the flow-splitting effect in the two-dimensional framework.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.99-117
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• 2020

This paper focuses on the processes of wind flow in atmospheric boundary layer, to produce realistic full scale pressures for design of low-rise buildings. CFD with LES turbulence closure is implemented on a scale 1:1 prototype building. A proximity study was executed computationally in CFD with LES that suggests new recommendations on the computational domain size, in front of a building model, apart from common RANS-based guidelines (e.g., COST and AIJ). Our findings suggest a location of the test building, different from existing guidelines, and the inflow boundary proximity influences pressure correlation and reproduction of peak loads. The CFD LES results are compared to corresponding pressures from open jet, full scale, wind tunnel, and the ASCE 7-10 standard for roof Component & Cladding design. The CFD LES shows its adequacy to produce peak pressures/loads on buildings, in agreement with field pressures, due to its capabilities of reproducing the spectral contents of the inflow at 1:1 scale.

• The Korean Journal of Applied Statistics
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.247-263
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• 2000

Natural catastrophe is defined as all damages caused by natural phenomenon such as typhoon, flood, inundation, windstorm, tidal wave, tremendous snowfall, drought,earthquake and to on It is classified at a huge hazard because of the large severity ofdamage In Korea, Fire Insurance policy includet the coverage clauses and rates of naturalcatastrophe like'Flood , Inundation Coverage Clause'and'Earthquake Coverage Clause'These clauses and rates do not reflect accurate risk of flood, inundation and earthauakein Korea. because those are tariff from other countries Hence, we determine the claimsize distributions and the rates for typhoon coverage and flood-inundation coverage byusing statistical methods which have not been used so far in Korean non-life insurance,and calculate appropriate premium for policyholder's interest

• Wind and Structures
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.151-177
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• 2009

The International Hurricane Research Center (IHRC) at Florida International University (FIU) is pursuing research to better understand hurricane-induced effects on residential buildings and other structures through full-scale aerodynamic and destructive testing. The full-scale 6-fan Wall of Wind (WoW) testing apparatus, measuring 4.9 m tall by 7.3 m wide, is capable of generating hurricane-force winds. To achieve windstorm simulation capabilities it is necessary to reproduce mean and turbulence characteristics of hurricane wind flows. Without devices and methods developed to achieve target wind flows, the full-scale WoW simulations were found to be unsatisfactory. To develop such devices and methods efficiently, a small-scale (1:8) model of the WoW was built, for which simulation devices were easier and faster to install and change, and running costs were greatly reduced. The application of such devices, and the use of quasiperiodic fluctuating waveforms to run the WoW fan engines, were found to greatly influence and improve the turbulence characteristics of the 1:8 scale WoW flow. Reasonable reproductions of wind flows with specified characteristics were then achieved by applying to the full-scale WoW the devices and methods found to be effective for the 1:8 scale WoW model.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.44 no.5
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• pp.611-631
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• 2012

The passive energy dissipation technology has been proven to be reliable and robust for recent practical applications. Various dampers or energy dissipation devices have been widely used in building structures for enhancing their performances during earthquakes, windstorm and other severe loading scenarios. This paper presents a simplified seismic design procedure for retrofitting earthquake-damaged frames with viscous dampers. With the scheme of designing the main frame and the supplemental viscous dampers respectively, the seismic analysis model of damped structure with viscous dampers and braces was studied. The specific analysis process was described and approach to parameter design of energy dissipation components was also proposed. The expected damping forces for damped frame were first obtained based on storey shear forces; and then they were optimized to meet different storey drift requirements. A retrofit project of a RC frame school building damaged in the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake was introduced as a case study. This building was retrofitted by using viscous dampers designed through the simplified design procedure proposed in this paper. Based on the case study, it is concluded that this simplified design procedure can be effectively used to make seismic retrofit design of earthquake-damaged RC frames with viscous dampers, so as to achieve structural performance objectives under different earthquake risk levels.

• Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.364-375
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• 2019

Background: Ecologists continue to investigate the factors that potentially affect the pattern and magnitude of tree damage during catastrophic windstorms in forests. However, there still is a paucity of research on which trees are more vulnerable to direct damage by winds rather than being knocked down by the fall of another tree. We evaluated this question in a mixed hardwood-softwood forest within the Big Thicket National Preserve (BTNP) of southeast Texas, USA, which was substantially impacted by Hurricane Rita in September 2005. Results: We showed that multiple factors, including tree height, shade-tolerance, height-to-diameter ratio, and neighborhood density (i.e., pre-Rita stem distribution) significantly explained the susceptibility of trees to direct storm damage. We also found that no single factor had pervasive importance over the others and, instead, that all factors were tightly intertwined in a complex way, such that they often complemented each other, and that they contributed simultaneously to the overall susceptibility to and patterns of windstorm damage in the BTNP. Conclusions: Directly damaged trees greatly influence the forest by causing secondary damage to other trees. We propose that directly and indirectly damaged (or susceptible) trees should be considered separately when assessing or predicting the impact of windstorms on a forest ecosystem; to better predict the pathways of community structure reorganization and guide forest management and conservation practices. Forest managers are recommended to adopt a holistic view that considers and combines various components of the forest ecosystem when establishing strategies for mitigating the impact of catastrophic winds.