Seismic fragility assessment of Balvano (Potenza, Italy) pre and post 1980 Irpinia's earthquake

The paper illustrates and discusses the results of a hybrid methodology to assess the seismic vulnerability of minor urban centres. The methodology, which allows for estimating damage scenarios when damaging data on buildings are not available, has been applied to the urban centre of Balvano. It is a small centre located on the meridional Apennine in Basilicata Region (Southern Italy), strongly hit by 1980 Irpinia's earthquake. Fragility curves, damage scenarios and expected annual losses before and after the 1980 seismic event have been defined and compared based on building features (obtained from interviews with local technicians and in-situ inspections), subdivision of buildings in typological classes and number of buildings for each class. As a result, (i) the damage scenario and vulnerability level of Balvano before 1980 was reconstructed and a good matching between the predicted, and occurred damage scenario resulted, and (ii) the seismic vulnerability following the reconstruction process of the Municipality was quantified and compared with that before 1980 earthquake, showing a significant reduction of vulnerability.