Cultural Heritage and Earthquake: The Case Study of “Santa Maria Della Carità” in Ascoli Piceno

In October 2016, two major earthquakes occurred in Marche region in the Centre of Italy, that resulted in widespread damage. The second one strokes Norcia, Visso, Arquata del Tronto, Accumoli and Amatrice, causing a lot of damages to cultural heritage of the cities of Tolentino, San Severino, Camerino and Ascoli Piceno, where the church of Santa Maria della Carità is located.

The church has high historical, architectural and social value for the city of Ascoli Piceno, because it is the only one that is opened to the devotees all time in the day and night. From the structural point of view, the church has a long and important annex to the north, which was later built with respect to the church, and after the L’Aquila earthquakes (2009) damages, the church was subjected to a retrofit intervention, in order to obtain a better “box-like behavior”.

This paper addresses how the relevant annex influenced the seismic response of this historical complex and how, more generally, this kind of asymmetric mass may affect the behavior of historic churches.

The results indicate that the presence of annex plays a significant role in the dynamic response of the church and affects the distribution of damages in the whole building. The results of the seismic simulation agree with the observed damage.