Case Study—An Extreme Example of Soil–Structure Interaction and the Damage Caused by Works on Foundation Strengthening

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

General: The paper discusses the strengthening interventions on the Cathedral of St. Theresa of Avila in Subotica, affected by an important crack pattern both in the cathedral and in the towers. Several interventions are described and the consequences of such interventions on the evolution of the crack pattern are also highlighted.

The paper fits well the topics of the Journal, however, it is opinion of this referee that the manuscript can be considered for publication after the Authors have considered the following comments.

1. Please, revise typographical errors throughout the manuscript.
2. The Authors specified that the described intervention was due to an important crack pattern, to improve readability a figure showing the damage may be introduced.
3. The Authors may improve the description of the state-of-art citing the use of non-destructive tests for the assessment of masonry structures and the interaction soil-masonry structure. Following recent findings are listed:

• Garzón-Roca, J., Adam, J.M., Sandoval, C., Roca, P. Estimation of the axial behaviour of masonry walls based on Artificial Neural Networks (2013) Computers and Structures, 125, pp. 145-152
• Ivorra S., Brotóns, V., Foti D., Diaferio, M.(2016) A preliminary approach of dynamic identification of slender buildings by neuronal networks. International Journal of Non-Linear Mechanics, Vol 80, Pages 183-189
• Ferraioli, M. , Lavino, A. , Abruzzese, D. Seismic Assessment, Repair and Strengthening of a Medieval Masonry Tower in Southern Italy. (2020) International Journal of Civil Engineering. Volume 18, Issue 9, 1 September 2020, Pages 967-994
• Diaferio, M., Foti, D., Sabbà, M.F., Lerna, M. A procedure for the seismic risk assessment of the cultural heritage. (2021) Bulletin of Earthquake Engineering 19(2), pp. 1027-1050
• Nuzzo, M. , Faella, G. The carmine maggiore bell tower: An inclusive and sustainable restoration experience (2021) Sustainability (Switzerland) Volume 13, Issue 3, 1 February 2021, Article number 1445, Pages 1-30

 

4. The Authors may better specify in the caption of figure 2 the plots in figure a) and b)
5. The R² value for I2-I3 X fig 6a, is very low. The figure shows that this is mainly due to a single point, a sentence may be inserted to justify this circumstance.
6. The Authors may insert more information regarding the 3D FE model: type and number of adopted finite elements, the utilized software, point number, internal restrains, etc.
7. The Authors specified that the cracks have been modelled by discontinuities in the FE model, however it is not clear whether the modelled cracks are extended throughout the wall
8. Please, revise the figure 9 because the legend cannot be read. Moreover, some information must be inserted regarding the considered loads responsible for the stresses in the figure 9
9. Some sentences may be inserted in section 4 to describe the connection between the proposed rc frame and the existing structure, and the possible problems due to the interaction between these structures.
10. Regarding the partial dismantling in section 4, experimental and numerical results on a tower which has been disassembled and reassembled may be found in the reference: Seismic risk assessment of Trani’s Cathedral bell tower in Apulia, Italy. (2017) International Journal of Advanced Structural Engineering, 9(3), pp. 259-267.

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1,

On behalf of the authors, I express my gratitude for the time you invested into reading and analyzing our manuscript.

Respectfully,

Danijel Kukaras

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper was well described and will be of interest to the readers of this journal. Just some very minor typos (e.g. line 295 "the Cathedral" and line 329 ("it is of the utmost importance..). 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2,

On behalf of the authors, I express my gratitude for the time you invested into reading and analyzing our manuscript.

Respectfully,

Danijel Kukaras

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The paper describes the structural features of the historical Cathedral of St. Theresa of Avila in Subotica (Serbia), with particular attention to the damages and cracks occurred along its life and the recovery projects that have followed one another over time. After systematic geotechnical and geodetic analysis, the Authors propose an important structural intervention to fix the problems that appear unresolved up to now.

The manuscript is a well-written techincal report, that may be of interest to civil engineering professionals. However, in my opinion, it does not provide any original contributions to justify a scientific publication on an international journal, where novel research outcomes would be expected by the reader.

Based on my previous comment, I don’t recommend publication of the manuscript in this form to Applied Sciences, at least in the form of “original article”. I leave to the Editor’s choice whether the form of “communication” might be more suitable.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1,

On behalf of the authors, I express my gratitude for the time you invested into reading and analyzing our manuscript.

Respectfully,

Danijel Kukaras

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The Authors revised the paper taking my suggestions into account. 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you very much for the positive review of our paper.

We made an extra effort to improve the English language and style of our paper.

Respectfully,

The authors 

Reviewer 3 Report

In the revised version of the manuscript, Authors added two sections on the discussion of the finite element modelling and literature overview.

I confirm my previous point of view: the paper is a very good, well-written and interesting technical report on a case-study but it is not a paper which describes original research.

I leave to the Editor the decision to accept or reject the paper, in view of the aims and scopes of the journal.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We are grateful for your opinion that the paper is a very good, well-written, and interesting technical report on a case study. We also understand the reservations that you expressed related to the original research aspects of the papers.

In that sense, we can state that we created our paper to share two general ideas.

One is to give a short, practical, account of our experience during the diagnostics and repair (that has started 5 years ago and is still in progress) of the structurally complex historic building, in a specific environment. Should have similar accounts been more widely available, we would surely modify our approach to the structural repair strategy for this structure. This fact made us believe that publishing this paper is valuable to our colleagues and researchers. The other, more specific, idea, is related to the in-situ, continuous 24 hours, measurements of the effects of polyurethane (PU) resin soil injection that is (in most of the other, "normal", situations) supposed to slightly move the building upwards. However, for this type of soil, PU injections proved to be completely ineffective. Initially, the building moved upwards, but then it returned down and even settled a bit more, therefore aggravating the damages, even more, further reducing the structure's reliability. We have found some research that leads to similar conclusions (and referred to them in the paper) but we have found no other papers that describe this phenomenon so directly and for the structure of similar significance. In our opinion, this qualifies as the research contribution of this paper. We agree with your opinion that it is for the Editor to make a final decision whether to accept or reject the paper, given the aims and scopes of the journal. Respectfully, The Authors  

Round 3

Reviewer 3 Report

Ok, you convinced me.