Experimental study and numerical simulation on damage assessment of reinforced concrete beams

•Building structures and their structural members are usually located in an adjacent physical field of explosion.•An explosion test is conducted on three groups of nine 1:6 scale models of reinforced concrete beams.•A monotonic loading test is conducted to assess the damage of these models of RC beams subjected to blast loads.•Dynamic response characteristics and damage effect of RC beams are investigated by the test study and numerical simulation.•A series of parameter studies are conducted to study the damage effect and failure modes of blast damaged RC beams.