April 2009, Earthquake Engineering Research Institute & Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center.
This is a somewhat belated post: On Saturday the 18th the EERI/PEER team visited the regional hospital serving the city of L’Aquila.
During our (limited) site visit we observed very little structural damage. Unfortunately the structural damage that did occur is located in crital areas. There is severe column damage in the farmacy area, which is considered to pose a collapse hazard. Operating theaters are located at the floor above the farmacy, and as a result could not be used. Another column that is shored at this time is right along the A&E access path, and posed a serious risk to people seeking medical attention after the earthquake.
We observed mainly non-structural damage at the hospitalm (say 90-95% of all damage was non-structural ). Failure of brick veneer cladding was widespread on the hospital campus. Many internal clay masonry partitions were also damaged. There are many signs of unanchored equipment that moved in the earthquake, but not to an extent where it damaged the equipment.
The hospital was evacuated after the earthquake, and remains closed. One of our principal concerns before allowing access to relatively undamaged buildings of the hospital would be the falling hazard that damaged brick veneer poses to access routes and travel paths through the hospital campus. They would need to be mitigated.
Talking to the people in the area around l’Aquila it is pretty clear what kind of performance is expected from a hospital after an earthquake: it should be operational.
