US engineers put earthquake-proof houses to the test

BUFFALO, New York, July 19 (Reuters) Engineers will not be surprised if months of work rattle to the ground this autumn, jolted apart by a mock earthquake that mimics a deadly 6.7-magnitude quake.

Their handiwork, a two-storey, 167-square-metre house built and placed on top of massive piston-powered shake tables, is an experiment after all.

But the experiment could change the way wood-frame buildings are designed and built, producing homes able to better withstand the effects of earthquakes from California to Japan.

A main reason is because engineers will use seismic dampers, essentially shock absorbers typically used in commercial buildings and bridges, to study how the earthquake's impact on a wood-frame house can be cushioned.

Engineers will pore over data from the big shake in November. The big test will follow a series of smaller jolt tests over coming months, done as part of the 1.2 million dollar NEESWood (Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation) project which began last year.

''Our model says the building will suffer significant damage,'' said Andre Filiatrault, an engineering professor at the University of Buffalo, which historically has been a centre for earthquake research. ''All the way to collapse perhaps.'' The NEESWood project, which is developing quake-proof construction ideas, is focused on wood-frame houses because it is an untapped market despite wood being the most commonly used material in residential housing in some seismic zones.

In November, when the house is fully built and furnished engineers plan to subject it to an earthquake modelled on the 1994 quake that hit Northridge, California and killed 60 people.

The Northridge quake is believed to be the costliest in US history with damages estimated at 40 billion dollar, engineers say, and wood-frame construction losses accounted for half that figure.

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