Assessment of steel structures designed for progressive collapse under localized fires

Structural design against the progressive collapse has been a vital necessity for decades due to occasional tragic events. The question of whether designed structures against the progressive collapse are still robust if subjected to multi-hazard scenarios containing column removal and successive localized fires is ad-dressed in the current study. Two seven-story steel structures with an identical area but different structural configurations of 4- and 5-bays are designed against the progressive collapse; the structural components are also fireproofed for a 60 min fire resistance. The structures are then subjected to different column re-moval scenarios over different stories followed immediately by localized fires. Results indicate that the structures are not able to keep their stability under all of the considered scenarios; the 4-bay structure is more vulnerable than the 5-bay structure. It is also indicated that upper stories are more sensitive toward the considered scenarios than lower stories. To advance structural safety, two strategies are adopted: in-creasing the thickness of the insulation materials to reduce the thermal effects, or, increasing the safety fac-tor (ΩN) of the structures when designing against the progressive collapse. As for the first strategy, provid-ing a 35% and a 25% increase in the insulation thicknesses of the structural components of the 4-bay and 5-bay structures, respectively, can prevent a progressive collapse to trigger. As for the second strategy, in-creasing ΩN by 10% can enhance the structural integrity to where no collapse occurs under all of the sce-narios.