SECED 2015 was a two-day conference on Earthquake and Civil Engineering Dynamics that took place on 9-10th July 2015 at Homerton College, Cambridge.
This was the first major conference to be held in the UK on this topic since SECED hosted the 2002 European Conference on Earthquake Engineering in London.
The conference brought together experts from a broad range of disciplines, including structural engineering, nuclear engineering, seismology, geology, geotechnical engineering, urban development, social sciences, business and insurance; all focused on risk, mitigation and recovery.
SECED 2015 featured the following keynote speakers (affiliations correct at the time of the conference):
SECED allows the self-archiving of the Author Accepted Manuscripts (AAM) from the SECED 2015 Conference. This means that all authors can make their conference paper available via a green open access route. The full text of your paper may become visible within your personal website, your institutional repository, a subject repository or a scholarly collaboration network signed up to the voluntary STM sharing principles. It may also be shared with interested individuals, for teaching and training purposes at your own institution and for grant applications (please refer to the terms of your own institution to ensure full compliance).
To deposit your AAM, please adhere to the following conditions:
SECED allows authors to deposit their AAM under the Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial International Licence 4.0 (CC BY-NC 4.0). The deposit must clearly state that the AAM is deposited under this licence and that any reuse is allowed in accordance with the terms outlined by the licence. To reuse the AAM for commercial purposes, permission must be sought by contacting seced@ice.org.uk. For the sake of clarity, commercial usage would be considered as, but not limited to:
Should you have any questions about our licensing policies, please contact seced@ice.org.uk.

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The low carbon footprint and high structural efficiency of engineered wood materials make tall-timber buildings an attractive option for high-rise construction. However, due to the relatively low mass and stiffness characteristics of timber structures, some concerns have been raised regarding their dynamic response. This paper examines the dynamic behaviour of tall timber buildings under tornado and downburst wind loads. It summarizes the results of extensive response history analyses over a suite of FE structural models subjected to different wind actions and compares them with the ISO10137 comfort criteria. In general, large levels of floor accelerations are observed in particular for stiffer medium-rise structures with significant density of walls. It is shown that downburst loading governs the peak acceleration response of medium-rise buildings whilst tornado loading becomes more critical for taller buildings. The effectiveness of TMDs in reducing peak acceleration values is explored. This study emphasizes the need for further studies on the dynamic behaviour of tall timber buildings.