Estimation of Basic Wind Speeds Reflecting Recent Wind Speed Data

Recent increase in the strength and frequency of typoons due to climate change claims reconsideration of the design wind load in existing design codes for civil engineering structures in which the basic wind speed is estimated based on meteorological data by mid 1990s. In this paper, based on wind speed data at 76 observatories in Korea from 1961 through 2008, the basic wind speeds which can be utilized in designing civil engineering structures including buildings and bridges are estimated using the statistical process. The return period of the wind speed for each location is determined using the Gumbel distribution. The results for considered locations are compared to the existing design codes. Also, for design applications, the wind speed map, which classifies the country into four basic wind speed zones, is proposed using the resulting basic wind speeds.