Seismic vulnerability analysis of these buildings represents a too difficult activity to be pursued at the design level. For this reason, a quick procedure for seismic vulnerability assessment of masonry aggregates of construction has been idealised with the purpose of determining the most vulnerable structural units on which more refined analyses should be carried out.

The elaborated speedy procedure derives from the well known vulnerability assessment form for masonry buildings [1], integrated by five parameters accounting for the aggregate conditions among adjacent units. Weights and scores of these new parameters have been determined by means of several finite element analyses developed with the 3MURI analysis software [2] on both single structural units and building aggregates.

The procedure set-up has been validated by performing a study in the Vesuvius area. Firstly, it has been applied to a single building block, providing the same vulnerability ranking as found in the numerical analyses. Subsequently, the method has been applied to a wide area of the historic centre of Torre del Greco, after that to the buildings of the same area the original survey form for the vulnerability assessment was applied. The results show that on average the original methodology overestimates one level the effective seismic vulnerability of the aggregated buildings.

The study has been completed by evaluating the damage expected in the investigated area subject to four earthquakes with different return periods from the new technical Italian code [3], by means of a well known damage-vulnerability-quake intensity relationship [4]. The analysis results have shown that little damage will occur under low intensity earthquakes, whereas under less frequent earthquakes damage from moderate to heavy (LLS), heavy to very heavy (CLS) and very heavy to destruction (exceptional earthquake) will be detected within the majority of the investigated buildings.

In conclusion, a new simplified mechanical-speedy procedure for assessing the behaviour of masonry aggregates has been implemented, applied and successfully validated by performing analyses on the historical centre area of Torre del Greco already investigated.

1

D. Benedetti, V. Petrini, "On the seismic vulnerability of masonry buildings: an evaluation method", L'Industria delle Costruzioni, 149, 66-74, 1984. (in Italian)

2

S.T.A.DATA, 3MURI, Seismic calculation of masonry structures according to M.D. 14/01/2008 "New technical codes for constructions", 2009.

3

Ministerial Decree of Public Works (M.D.) published on 14/01/08, "New technical codes for constructions", Official Gazette of the Italian Republic, 29, 4 February 2008.

4

S. Cattari, E. Curti, S. Giovinazzi, S. Lagomarsino, S. Parodi, A. Penna, "A mechanical model for the vulnerability analysis of the masonry built-up at urban scale", Proc. of the 11th Italian Congress "L'Ingegneria Sismica in Italia", Genoa, 2004. (in Italian)

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