ABSTRACT
As standards and recommendations related to damage to structures from blasting refer to a combination of peak particle velocity and dominant frequency in any of the three components of ground motion (AENOR 1993, BSI 1993, DIN 1999, Singh & Roy 2010, Siskind et al. 1980), these parameters should be derived from the recorded waveforms. The estimation of peak particle velocities is a clear issue, whereas the estimation of dominant frequency is more controversial. Dominant frequency is often regarded, as suggested by DIN standard (1999), as the frequency at which the spectral amplitude, derived through fast Fourier transform analysis, is maximum. Sometimes, the maximum of the modulus of the particle velocity (i.e. vector peak particle velocity) is considered for damage prevention (Blair 1999). In such cases, the dominant frequency is obtained from the mean frequency spectrum of the longitudinal, transversal and vertical components of ground motion (Blair & Armstrong 1999).
