Seismic response and retrofitting proposals of the St. Titus Chruch, Heraklion, Crete, Greece

The purpose of this work is to investigate the seismic behavior of St. Titus Church in Heraklion, Crete, Greece as well as the need of its seismic retrofitting. A numerical model of the Church is constructed using shell finite elements and it is then seismically examined using response spectrum and linear timehistory analyses. Effects of soil-structure interaction have been also taken into account. The Church without retrofit is expected to exhibit extensive tensile failures and many compressive ones. Aiming to maintain the architectural character of the structure as well as to increase its seismic resistance, a retrofitting procedure involving injection of cement grout in conjunction with reinforced concrete jacketing to the internal side of the masonry walls is proposed. A numerical implementation of the proposed seismic retrofitting is performed and its effect is evaluated by response spectrum and linear time-history analyses. From the results of these analyses, it is shown that compressive failures are eliminated while only few tensile failures of local character take place.