Engineering Commons^™

Rubble Pile Characterization Model, William P. Schonberg, Jason Baird, Paul Nicholas Worsey, Abdeldjelil Belarbi, Roger A. Laboube, Braden Lusk, R. Flanagan, H. Burleson, Robert S. Woodley, Warren Noll

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Rubble piles created following the collapse of a building in a combat situation can significantly impact mission accomplishment, particularly in the area of movement and maneuver. Rubble characteristics must be known, for example, in order to predict the ability of a vehicle to override the collateral damage from weapon effects in urban areas. Two types of models are developed: a first-order model and a first-principles-based model. In both models, we assume complete rubblization of the building and develop a rubble profile model using the size and composition of the collapsed structure to predict the rubble volume. In both cases, this …