Being in a seismic zone, Bhutan is prone to earthquakes. To build more earthquake resilient structures in the country, the department of culture is introducing ‘shaking table’ facility.
First of its kind in the country, the facility will help understand the characteristics and performance of buildings in the country.
Shaking table as the name suggests is an experimental technique used to test the response of structures to verify the seismic performance.
The table is connected to a computer that has a database of the recorded motions from past earthquakes simulating a real earthquake scenario on about just any structure.
“Through the facility, we will try to see what the inherent weak points are and based on that we are going to retrofit the whole structure. So what is more important is that we will be able to understand the behaviour of the structure. With that, we could come up with some scientific codes and then would be incorporated into building rules and regulations,” Pema, the Engineer of Department of Culture, said.
The facility was built with a cost of USD 0.7 M. The installation of a shaking table is part of a five-year project of the department of culture funded by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
