Assessing the safety of schools affected by geo-hydrologic hazards: the geohazard safety classification (GSC)

International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, Volume 15, March 2016, Pages 80–93, doi:10.1016/j.ijdrr.2015.11.006:

This paper presents a new cost-effective methodology and procedure to rapidly assess the geohazard safety classification (GSC) of schools and provides useful information to local decision makers. The GSC, based on the concepts of hazard, vulnerability and resilience, can be calculated integrating ancillary data by means of rapid and not invasive field surveys and questionnaires distributed to the schools employees.

Moreover, it can be easily read and understood since it uses the same type of scale as energy efficiency, to indicate the occupants' safety in case of adverse events related to geo-hydrologic hazards. This new rapid assessment methodology has been tested on 10 schools in Tuscany (Italy) and the present paper shows how the GSC can be strongly affected by the lack of ancillary information or the incompleteness of the Risk Assessment Document as well as the school occupants' poor perception of geo-hydrologic risk.