Analytical study on detection of structural damages of a long-span suspension bridge by wind-induced response

Nowadays, a great number of long-span bridges were constructed all over the world. These bridges are very expensive to design, construct and maintain. In general, their service time is over 100 years, although they were subjected severe environmental long-term loads effects such as fatigue, material deterioration and other load effects. As a result, the health, durability, and safety of these bridges in a long-term service period are now attracting a lot of scientists and engineers. Some long-span suspension bridges are monitored for the purpose of their health monitoring. An issue arising will be a methodology how the structural damages can be detected from the monitoring data. This paper aims to investigate how the structural damages affect the wind-induced response of a long-span suspension bridge. Because a long-span suspension bridge produces large wind-induced responses from which the structural damages may be easily relative detected. Lessons archived from this study are expected not only to maintain this bridge but also to improve our understanding of the real bridge performance as well as to provide useful feedbacks for future design.