A new joint application of non-invasive remote sensing techniques for structural health monitoring

This paper aims at analysing the potentialities of a new technological approach for the dynamic monitoring of civil infrastructures. The proposed approach is based on the joint use of a high-frequency thermal camera and a microwave radar interferometer to measure the oscillations due to traffic excitations of the Sihlhochstrasse Bridge, Switzerland, which was selected as test bed site in the ISTIMES project (EU - Seventh Framework Programme). The good quality of the results encourages the use of the proposed approach for the static and dynamic investigation of structures and infrastructures. Moreover, the remote sensing character of the two applied techniques makes them particularly suitable to study structures located in areas affected by natural hazard phenomena, and also to monitor cultural heritage buildings for which some conventional techniques are considered invasive. Obviously, their reliability needs further experiments and comparisons with standard contact sensors.