Behavior of Columns During Earthquakes

The behavior of columns in earthquakes is very important since column failures may lead to additional structural failures and result in total building collapses. For example, in the Mexico City earthquake, the most frequent observed cause of structural failure was linked to inadequate beam-to-column and slab-to-column connections. Building configurations may cause columns to be over stressed. Columns of unequal length result in unequal load distribution and hence failure. Column construction and underlying soils also are factors in column failures.