Here you will find news relevant to the activities of the initiative including webinars, talks, consulting projects, publications, participation in conferences and meetings mostly relevant to resilience of critical infrastructure with emphasis on transport and energy assets and their intra/interdependencies, views on the UNs Sustainable Development Goals and use of digital and emerging technologies in infrastructure resilience- and sustainability-based management
14
Jan 20
Inspection of the landmark Polyfytos Lake Bridge of Servia, Greece
In continuation to our involvement with the inspection of the High Bridge of Servia (Polyfytos Lake Bridge), Stergios spoke to the national tv channels ERT1 and ERT3 (@ time 1h35min) analysing “what’s next” for this landmark bridge of high importance and how this affects the resilience of the network, the region and beyond.
Our involvement with the inspection of the bridge has been covered extensively by local and international media.
Press releases and reports:
tovima.gr kathimerini.gr ethnos.gr ert.gr
zougla.gr makthes.gr msn.com greekcitytimes (en)
eleftherostypos.gr neoskosmos.com (Australia)
kozaniTV
* The similarity is the use of Gerber simply supported spans on cantilevers. Also, the understanding is now that the preliminary interview, on 15 August 2018, one day after the collapse of the bridge (see Stergios’s BBC interview here) has provided a relatively accurate comment: “…some environmental factors may have caused this bridge to deteriorate early… rust can be seen at the top of the tendons” is in accordance with the detailed research published 16 months later by Calvi et al. (2019): “The loss of a stay seems to be the final cause of collapse…The possible initial cause of the collapse may thus be related to fatigue problems in the tendons near the tip of the antenna, or by deterioration of the connection between stay and transverse link.” The latter raises concerns with regard to the design of the system of protection of the tendons adopted by professor Morandi. 13
Jan 20
Polyfytos Lake Bridge of Servia in the media
In continuation to Stergios involvement with the High Bridge of Servia (Polyfytos Lake Bridge), Stergios will be talking to the national tv channels ERT1 (14 Jan, after 7am-GR time) and ERT3 (14 Jan, after 11am-GR time) analysing “what’s next” for this landmark bridge of high importance and how this affects the resilience of the network, the region and beyond.
18
Dec 19
PhD examination at Imperial College
Stergios participated today in the examination of a PhD dissertation at Imperial College, on the design of externally prestressed timber bridges. Very interesting topic and impressive work. Thank you Christian Málaga-Chuquitaype for the invitation.
4
Dec 19
Meeting with Highways England: “University research – highway structures – hydraulic actions & extreme weather events”
21
Oct 19
Lecture on Risk and Resilience of Bridges and Networks-21/10/2019
Stergios was invited by Prof E Chatzi and delivered a lecture on “Risk and Resilience of Bridges and Networks” at ETH Zurich-Institute of Structural Engineering, followed by interesting discussions and exchange of ideas on resilience assessment challenges!
18
Oct 19
Meeting with industrial partner SIKA AG
Stergios and Dimitra had a fruitful meeting with Dr Annika Baier and Dr Fabien Choffat in the headquarters of SIKA AG in Zurich. The future trends of bond technologies for FRP measures were discussed with the industrial partner of Briface H2020-MSCA-IF project.
11
Oct 19
ETH Zurich: Lecture on Risk and Resilience of Bridges and Networks
Stergios is giving an invited lecture on “Risk and Resilience of Bridges and Networks” at ETH Zurich-Institute of Structural Engineering on Monday 21st of October.
Abstract: The exposure of bridges and transportation networks to natural hazards is proven to have severe consequences on world economies and societies. Therefore, risk and resilience assessment of these assets to extreme events and sequences of diverse hazards is of paramount importance for maintaining their functionality and continuous operation even after severe natural and human-induced hazards. In this context, engineers, consultants, owners and operators would be benefited in the design, assessment and decision-making process from quantifications of risk and resilience. This quantification should account for the sequence of hazards, the type and extent of damage and impact in bridge or network functionality, the latter expressed by robustness, and the importance of the asset, the available resources and priorities, including the rapidity and resourcefulness. This lecture will provide a systematic introduction to the concept of risk and resilience assessment of bridges and transportation networks. Examples and practical applications will be presented to illustrate the main components of risk and resilience, i.e. hazard actions, typology of bridges, damage modes, fragility/vulnerability analysis, loss assessment (direct/indirect), restoration, mitigation measures and decision-making for networks.
9
Oct 19
Participation in the Lloyd’s Register Foundation International Conference 2019
Stergios Mitoulis and Dimitra Achillopooulou represent our group at the “Lloyd’s Register Foundation International Conference 2019” in London, 9-10 October.
Interesting discussions and insights toward engineering a safer and more resilient world!
11
Sep 19
Participation in SECED2019
We participated in the SECED2019 conference in Greenwich, London, 9-10 September 2019, presenting a paper on the “Fragility of bridges exposed to multiple hazards and impact on transport network resilience” (by Yuan V, Argyroudis S, Tubaldi E, Pregnolato M, Mitoulis S) and organised a session on “Fragility, vulnerability & infrastructure resilience” with inspiring discussions toward “a resilient world”.
