Historical damage pattern and causes of differential damage: an approach based on combining geophysical prospecting, geological and historical-technical data

摘要

We describe a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary method to analyse thecauses of differential macroseismic effects caused by an earthquake in ahistorical town. We illustrate the method with a case study based onanalysing the damage caused by the 1930 Irpinia earthquake (Me=6.7) inMelfi, a town in southern Italy. A damage pattern map was already availablefor this site.To understand the anomalies of Melfi damage, we used an integrated approachthat combines geological surveys, geophysical prospecting and analysis ofunpublished technical-historical data.Geo-electrical prospecting was adopted to infer the geological set-up and toestimate the thickness of shallow deposits. The results of the geophysicalsurveys were compared with detailed geological information derived from bothin situ surveys and boreholes. Finally, cross-correlation among these data andtechnical reports coeval to the earthquake allowed us to create a completepicture of the possible causes of uneven damage.