Military traffic often utilizes bridges designed and maintained by civilian authorities. These bridges are located not only in home and allied countries, but also in foreign theatres of operation. The use of civilian bridges by military vehicles is in the NATO countries regulated and governed by STANAG 2021. This standard, however, does not fully deliver the essential aspects such as defined safety concept or specified values for partial factors that are important for a safe and reliable crossing of military vehicles over existing bridges. This work is aimed at investigating the military loads and developing a suitable safety concept that can be utilized during the military assessment of concrete bridges. A number of factors must be taken into account, including target reliability index and probabilistic models related to dynamic amplification factor, static load due to military vehicle and applied load effect model. The calculated partial factors for semi-probabilistic safety concept are significantly dependent on the selected crossing condition. The results show that the military partial factors for assessment of existing bridges can be generally considered lower than those factors listed in modern structural codes for bridge engineering.    «

Military traffic often utilizes bridges designed and maintained by civilian authorities. These bridges are located not only in home and allied countries, but also in foreign theatres of operation. The use of civilian bridges by military vehicles is in the NATO countries regulated and governed by STANAG 2021. This standard, however, does not fully deliver the essential aspects such as defined safety concept or specified values for partial factors that are important for a safe and reliable crossin...    »