The force of an earthquake on a building is directly related to its mass.

Reinforced concrete
building is considered heavy compared to buildings with other materials, therefore not a suitable
material for building lightweight. However RC building has advantage over other materials, such
as good performance against fire and good service life with low maintenance cost. For RC
building to perform well in earthquake, building should have a good design to resist the seismic
load followed by good quality work implementation. Otherwise the RC building might fail in the
following ways:
Column Failure
Columns can experience two types of failure modes, namely axial-flexural failure and shear
failure. The resistance due to axial-flexural effects can be limited by making the beams weak and
columns strong. As a result, the beams absorb the earthquake energy and sustain damage in the
process. Shear failure in columns can be avoided by providing closely spaced transverse ties that
enclose all the vertical bars.
Pounding
This phenomenon is normally caused by two adjacent buildings hitting each other during an
earthquake due to building too close together and have different natural periods of vibration.

The weakest points in the structure are the maximum moment areas in the columns. The concrete
crumbled as a combination of the large forces and of poor quality.

The columns should be have a ductile design and be designed stiffer than the floors in multi storey
building. This would prevent the building to collapse, pancake and cause of the death of the
inhabitants.
The mass of the building is moved because of the earthquake. When the earthquake forces exceed
the design parameters, the alternating forces of the earthquake first break the concrete on one side
of the column and subsequently on the other side.
By repeated movements and lack of stirrups, the broken concrete will fall out of the construction
and the steel will bend, becoming useless.

Earthquake resistant structural systems

In accordance to EC8-5.2.2.1, the RC building structural system should belong to one of the
following structural types according to their behaviour under horizontal seismic action:
- Frame system: Both the vertical and lateral loads are mainly resisted by space frames
- Ductile wall system (coupled or uncoupled): Both the vertical and lateral loads are mainly
resisted by vertical structural walls coupled or uncoupled, with high shear resistance
- Dual system: The vertical loads is mainly supported by a space frame and the lateral loads is
partly resisted by both frame system and structural wall
- Inverted pendulum system: 50% of the systems mass is located in the upper third of the height
of the structure
- Torsionally flexible system: Dual or wall system not having a minimum torsional rigidity