Bringing to Buildings the Healing Touch

Civilization and civil engineering are intimately connected, and few animate — inanimate relationships are more enduring than those between human beings and their built environment. This interactive relationship goes back thousands of years. The assessment of how a building will react to a natural disaster like an earthquake requires a detailed examination of the architectural features and engineering design. Structural damage can always be investigated after it has occurred, but the challenge is to pre-empt such damage by suitably equipping a building in advance to resist the onslaught of disaster.