Reliability analysis of seismic bearing capacity of strip footing by stochastic slip lines method

The problem of the seismic bearing capacity of shallow strip footings can be determined indirectly, byadopting an equivalent pseudo-static approach. However, the inherent uncertainties of the parameterswhich affect seismic bearing capacity dictate that problem is of a probabilistic nature rather than beingdeterministic. In this research, the stochastic slip lines method is used for reliability assessment of seismicbearing capacity of strip footing. The stochastic soil parameters are modeled using cross correlatednormal probability density function and peak horizontal earthquake acceleration ratio is modeled byexponential probability density function. Furthermore, covariance matrix decomposition approach is usedto random filed discretization. Comparison of the results shows that the proposed model can predictsclose bearing capacity with respect to the literature. However, the proposed method can considerablyreduce the computational time and memory requirements. The results of sensitivity analysis show that thehorizontal seismic coefficient and internal friction angle are the most effective parameters on bearingcapacity of the strip foundation.