Damage to religious buildings due to the Pianura Padana Emiliana earthquake

Elena Candigliota, Bruno Carpani, Francesco Immordino, Alessandro Poggianti - ENEA, Technical Unit for Seismic Engineering

The paper reports the most common mechanisms of damage in churches, oratories and steeples as a result of the damage survey carried out by ENEA researchers in the areas of Emilia-Romagna region affected by the earthquake of May 2012, with particular reference to the historical centres. The surveys, mainly carried out immediately after the event, concerned the mere observation of the damage from the outside. Considering the great extent of the area affected, from the province of Ferrara to those of Bologna and Modena, and the large number of churches in any Italian town, it is easy to imagine the amount of damage caused by this earthquake to religious, architectural and artistic heritage. The earthquake showed the high vulnerability of the religious heritage of Emilia-Romagna and, more generally, of the Italian heritage, mostly located in areas of high seismicity, too often subject only to unsystematic interventions of repair, consolidation, renovation