Hurricane vulnerability model for mid/high-rise residential buildings

Catastrophe models appraise the natural risk of the built-infrastructure simulating the interaction of its exposure and vulnerability with a hazard. Because of unique configurations and reduced number, mid/high-rise buildings present singular challenges to the assessment of their damage vulnerability. This paper presents a novel approach to estimate the vulnerability of mid/high-rise buildings (MHB) which is used in the Florida Public Hurricane Loss Model, a catastrophe model developed for the state of Florida. The MHB vulnerability approach considers the wind pressure hazard exerted over the building's height as well as accompanying rain. The approach assesses separately the damages caused by wind, debris impact, and water intrusion on building models discretized into typical apartment units. Hurricane-induced water intrusion is predicted combining the estimates of impinging rain with breach and pre-existing building defect size estimates. Damage is aggregated apartment-by-apartment and story-by-story, and accounts for vertical water propagation. The approach enables the vulnerability modeling of regular and complex building geometries in the Florida exposure and elsewhere.