Analysis of first results of the seismic vulnerability programme of schools in Abruzzo: state of implementation and issues emerged

The seismic safety conditions of school buildings represent one of the main issues in the context of the safety of existing buildings in Italy, both because of the time of construction of most of the school heritage currently in use, often dating back to years prior to the seismic classification of the territory, and the high exposure related to the number of people involved in a possible collapse of the structures. This generally results in high risk conditions that require specific actions to be taken by the owners, preceded by campaigns to assess the level of vulnerability, useful for the definition and scheduling retrofit intervention on buildings. Recently, as part of a collaboration between the Abruzzo Region and the CNR-ITC, the data contained in the " sheet of seismic assessment of strategic or relevant buildings (Ordinance no. 3274/2003 - Article 2, paragraphs 3 and 4, DM 14/01/2008), relating to about 400 of these school buildings, have been uploaded in a database. The article presents the most significant results of the carried out vulnerability assessments program, providing a picture of the safety conditions of the Abruzzo school heritage. The process that leads to the definition of the safety index of the structure, in accordance with the indications of the Italian regulations, is strongly influenced by the choices made by the practitioner in charge, regarding the definition of the materials survey campaign, the modelling methods, the use of specific safety coefficients, which can lead to a significant dispersion of the results, even if starting from similar assumptions. The analysis of the data of the analyzed sample can provide a key to the reading of the aspects described above, useful for the definition of guidelines aimed at promoting results comparison.