Discussing the increasing need to protect civilian infrastructure and industrial facilities against unintentional loads arising from accidental impact and explosion events as well as terrorist attack, this book contains papers presented at the 15th International Conference on Structures under Shock and Impact. This successful conference series has been regularly held since it began in 1989 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

While advances have been made over this period many challenges remain, such as to develop more effective and efficient blast and impact mitigation approaches than currently exist. The primary focus remains the survivability of physical facilities and the protection of people, as well as reducing economic losses and impact on the environment, with emphasis on innovative protective technologies to support the needs of an economically growing, modern society. The application of this technology ranges from the safe transportation of people in several modes and the transportation of dangerous or combustible materials to defences against natural hazard threats such as flood, wind, storm, tsunami and earthquake.

Large scale testing is prohibitive and small scale laboratory testing results in scaling uncertainties. Continuing research is therefore essential to improve knowledge on how these structures behave under a variety of load actions, some of which interact making it even more complex and difficult to define. Consequently, more use of advanced numerical simulations for load and structural response calculations is common practice in industry and research. Such calculations can directly be used in design and risk assessment calculations, but also be applied as input to more simplified design tools and design codes.

Whether numerical or analytical modelling techniques are employed, experimental validation is vital for there to be acceptance of the approach to be used. The published research aims for the exchange of ideas and results to promote a better understanding of the critical issues relating to the testing behaviour, modelling and analyses of protective structures against blast and impact loading.