Performance of stainless steel winery tanks during the 02/27/2010 Maule earthquake

Abstract

The Maule earthquake (February 27, 2010, Chile), one of the largest recorded in history,affected a large area of the country, where several important industries were located. Thewine industry was particularly vulnerable, because most of the Chilean wine wasproduced in the affected area. With the support of the industry and the government, alarge reconnaissance effort was undertaken. The inspection found several issues with thetanks and other elements used in the wine making process that resulted in large losses,including lack of structural seismic design and detailing, lack of redundancy, andinadequate anchorage design and execution. A summary of the major findings of thisinspection are presented, followed by a comparison of the results of a linear andnonlinear finite element models of one case of the tank typology most damaged by theearthquake, namely a leg-supported tank, with the observed performance. The finiteelement models were able to predict the location of stress and strains concentrations andthe type of damage that led to the failure of the structures represented by the models.Additionally, the capacity obtained from the models compared favorably with thecapacity obtained using an approximate design method proposed by other researchers.These results could be used to develop seismic design and construction guidelines tolower the vulnerability of the wine industry in future earthquakes.