Today we visited a number of small villages south-east of l’Aquila, including Onna and Monticchio.
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| Figure 1. Onna. |
Onna suffered badly in the earthquake. Almost all buildings in the historical center show signs of damage, and many collapsed. About 40 lives were lost on a population of 350. Many of the damaged buildings and the building remains pose collapse hazards. At the time of our visit buildings were being shored or demolished to mitigate falling hazards and provide the citizens with a safe opportunity to visit their houses to gather any belongings that can be salvaged.
Monticchio on the other hand suffered little from the earthquake. We walked through the historical center, and saw mainly minor cracking in walls and failure of some parapet walls. We visited a house that was retrofitted by confining the walls with a welded wire mesh on both sides, connected with through bars. The only sign of damage that this building showed was a crack in the wall at the first floor were new material and historic fabric abutted. Down from the village into the valley we did find a few concrete structures with more sever damage, including failure of infill walls and buckling of bars in the hinge zone of the concrete columns.
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| Figure 2. Monticchio. |
The current thought is that the site conditions have driven the difference in performance. Monticchio is built on a hill side on rock, whereas Onna is built in the plane on softer soil layers.
