After each major earthquake, tens of thousands of damaged buildings need rapid assessment – initially for safety checks, and ultimately for the determination of claims. After Italy’s 1997 Umbria-Marche earthquake more than 50,000 houses and other buildings were assessed in a matter of a few weeks by rapidly assembled teams.

Recruiting and training a corps of engineers to be ready to carry out these assessments is the responsibility, in Italy, of the National Seismic Agency (SSN). To assist them in this task, CAR’s Italian sister company CAR Progetti has built ‘MEDEA’, a multi-media manual on CD-Rom.

As well as details of the procedures specific to Italian practice, MEDEA contains much information of international interest – the first comprehensive definitions of earthquake damage mechanisms for masonry and reinforced concrete buildings, lists of ‘symptoms’ of each mechanism which the assessors can recognise, a glossary of construction terminology, and an extensive picture database of earthquake damage from many earthquakes in Italy and elsewhere.

The CD also contains a set of exercises which, taking advantage of Quick Time Virtual Reality technology, allow the surveyors to practice the compilation of the forms as they will be called to do in the field.

Separate CDs for Masonry and RC buildings are now available in Italian, and the English versions are being prepared.