ABSTRACT
Fire is one of the most severe loads for buildings and critical infrastructures. Therefore, a correct assessment of the reliability of structural elements exposed to fire is very important. While traditionally a lognormal distribution is used to characterize the resistance of structural elements, this approximation may not be acceptable in case of fire. Based on physical considerations, the bending resistance of a concrete slab during fire can be modeled by a mixed lognormal distribution, i.e. a weighted sum of lognormal distributions. Examples illustrate the excellent performance of this improved modeling technique.
