A MODEL FOR STRUCTURAL SAFETY USING THE EXTREME VALUE APPROACH

A new method of evaluating the safety of a structure using the maximum mean largest value concept is introduced. The maximum probability of failure is defined by employing the upper bound of load and lower bound of resistance; that is, structural safety is evaluated under the worst-state both for load and resistance. This is a distribution-free approach to the concept of structural safety, and the probability of failure is calculated without assuming the probability density distributions of load and resistance. Three new characteristics are introduced so that the character of the data is strongly reflected on the estimation of the maximum probability of failure. A numerical example is given using the test data.