On 6 February 2023, two independent earthquake pairs on the East Anatolian Fault Zone, with epicenters in Pazarcık (Mw = 7.7) and Elbistan (Mw = 7.6) districts of Kahramanmaraş province, caused great destruction. Adıyaman and Gölbaşı districts of this city are among the settlements most affected by the earthquake. Especially in the district where geotechnical damages are most observed, the destructive effects of earthquakes have been clearly observed in buildings with different structural systems. In this study, information is given about the earthquakes that hit the region and the fault zone where the earthquakes occur. Geotechnical and structural damages occurring in the villages and center of the district were evaluated within the scope of earthquakes and structural engineering. It can be stated that damages observed in the district center are generally caused by soil–structure interaction problems. The fact that masonry structures, which are widely used in rural areas, do not benefit from any engineering services has an impact on the level of damage. The main reason for the damages occurring in the reinforced concrete structures in the district is the reinforced concrete system that is not designed properly or not built in accordance with the design. This case study demonstrated the importance of earthquake–soil–structure interactions in line with earthquake-resistant building design principles.

Many reinforced-concrete structures collapsed or were seriously damaged in the 7.7 and 7.6 magnitude earthquakes that occurred in southern Türkiye on 6 February 2023. The recorded peak ground accelerations were quite high (2.2 g) and the recorded motions’ elastic acceleration response spectra were significantly greater than the elastic design spectra given by the most recent Turkish seismic design code. A total of 518,000 houses were heavily damaged or collapsed in the eleven cities affected by the earthquake. More than 53,000 people lost their lives and over 100,000 people were injured, the majority of these injurits caused by the collapse of reinforced concrete structures. Post-earthquake damage assessments are important in the context of applying sustainability principles to building design and construction. In this study, post-earthquake damage assesments and evaluations were made for the reinforced-concrete structures that were exposed to destruction or various structural damage in Hatay, Kahramanmaraş and Adıyaman, which where most affected after the Kahramanmaraş earthquakes. The RC building damage and failure mechanisms resulting from field observations were evaluated in detail from a broad performance-based structural and earthquake engineering perspective. Information about Kahramanmaraş earthquakes is given briefly. Design spectra and spectral accelerations were compared for the earthquake stations in these three provinces. Soft/weak story, short column, insufficiently reinforced-concrete, and poor workmanship are the primary causes of structural damage, which cause earthquake weaknesses in these buildings.

The 6th February 2023 Pazarcık and Elbistan earthquakes (M_w = 7.7 and M_w = 7.6) caused great destruction in many cities and were the disaster of the century for Türkiye. The greatest destruction was caused in the provinces of Hatay, Kahramanmaraş, and Adıyaman during these earthquakes, which were independent of each other and occurred on the same day. Information about earthquakes and strong ground motion records is given within the scope of this study. Reinforced concrete (RC) structures which constitute a large part of the urban building stock in the earthquake region were exposed to structural damage at different levels. The structural damage in the RC structures in the city center, Gölbaşı, and Kahta districts of the province of Adıyaman was evaluated within the scope of earthquake and civil engineering after field investigations. Insufficient RC, low-strength concrete reinforcement problems, RC frame failure, heavy overhang, short columns, soft story, and pounding effect are the main causes of the earthquake damage. The presence of these factors that reduce the earthquake resistance of RC structures increased the damage level. In addition, the fact that the earthquakes occurred nine hours apart and the continuation of aftershocks during that period negatively affected the damage levels. It has been observed that structures that receive the necessary engineering services during the construction and project phases ensure the safety of life and property, even if the structure is slightly damaged. In this study, we also tried to reveal whether the target displacements were satisfactorily represented by numerical analysis for a sample RC structure.

Huge losses of life and property occurred as a result of two independent catastrophic earthquakes on 6 February 2023 in the Eastern Anatolian Fault Zone, where no significant earthquake has occurred in approximately 500 years. The earthquakes, whose epicenters were in the Pazarcık and Elbistan districts of Kahramanmaraş province at 9 h intervals, had magnitudes of M_w = 7.7 and M_w = 7.6 and caused different levels of structural damage, especially in masonry-style structures in rural areas. In this study, the damage that occurred in masonry village schools, especially in rural areas, during these two earthquakes was evaluated in terms of the characteristics of the earthquake and within the scope of civil engineering, and the causes of the damage were discussed. The damage levels of the masonry schools examined were classified using the European Macroseismic Scale (EMS-98). Information about the Kahramanmaraş earthquakes was given and structural analyses were carried out for a widely used reference school building. The school building block was analytically modeled, and its seismic load-bearing capacities were predicted through pushover analysis in TREMURI software. The study also includes repair and strengthening recommendations for such structures.