Post-earthquake damage assessment of traditional masonry buildings: A case study of Bhaktapur municipality following 2015 Gorkha (Nepal) earthquake

Bhaktapur municipality, one of the historic urban area, suffered heavy damage to many of its public residential buildings due to April 25, 2015, Gorkha (Nepal) earthquake. Immediately after this devastating earthquake, rapid visual damage assessment of 3979 buildings, in seventeen wards of Bhaktapur municipality, was carried out. This study was motivated to bring consciousness, revealing the vulnerable parameters of traditional masonry construction practice, for future safer buildings construction practice at this neighbourhood. Moreover, the establishment of 2105 Gorkha earthquake induced damage databases are undertaken, aiming to increase the availability of damage data for future research work. In this paper, the results obtained from comparative analysis of damage database and chisquare test for its validity is presented. Nevertheless, it is necessary to carry out detail damage assessment to identify the seismic sensitivity of the common structural components.