Earthquake in Irpinia in 1980

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The earthquake in the Irpinia , or Irpinia earthquake for short , in 1980 ( Terremoto dell'Irpinia in Italian ) with tremors of magnitude 6.89 on the moment magnitude scale shook the regions of Campania and Basilicata on November 23, 1980 at 18: 34 o'clock UTC . The Schütter area comprised a region between Naples and Potenza . The hypocenter of the earthquake was at a depth of 20 km.

Effects of the earthquake

The Irpinia region in the Avellino province was hardest hit . The provinces of Benevento , Salerno and Potenza also suffered severe damage . There was heavy destruction around Conza della Campania in the places Castelnuovo di Conza , Laviano , Lioni , Sant'Angelo dei Lombardi , Santomenna , Calabritto , Caposele , Guardia Lombardi , Pescopagano , Sant'Andrea di Conza , San Mango sul Calore , San Michele di Serino , Senerchia and Teora . The inner cities of Avellino and Potenza also suffered severe damage; they were subsequently rebuilt in a modern way. The former municipality of Apice is now a ghost town; the place was completely rebuilt a few kilometers away. The earthquake was felt all over southern Italy.

2,914 people were killed, over 10,000 were injured and more than 300,000 people were left homeless. More than 90 aftershocks made the rescue work difficult. Disaster relief was not only provided by the Italian authorities; donations and government support were received from all over the world. US $ 70 million was donated by the United States , 32 million from Germany , and aid was also received from countries such as Iraq (3.1 million) and Algeria (0.5 million). A total of Lire 58.640 billion has been invested to repair the damage over the years . There was considerable controversy over the use of the funds, as the correct allocation of the aid was questioned. In addition to many corrupt local politicians who enriched themselves with the international aid funds, the local Camorra also siphoned off considerable sums - both in the form of bogus construction projects and protection funds that were extorted from the aid organizations. Only about a quarter of the total went to the actual victims. In the course of the three-year distribution struggle that spread between the Camorra clans from 1980 onwards, another eight hundred people died.

Geological framework

The Irpinia is one of the most earthquake-endangered regions in the South Apennines . Here, in a zone following the course of the Apennines, earthquakes with an intensity of more than IX on the Mercalli scale occur on average every 20 years , most of them at depths between 20 and 30 kilometers. The tensions responsible for the earthquakes can be traced back to the opening of the Tyrrhenian Sea and the ongoing folding and thrusting processes in the South Apennines.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cfti 4.0 Catalog of Strong Italian Earthquakes. Map server of Italian earthquakes (English / Italian) and download of the corresponding catalog
  2. ^ Italy: Avellino, Potenza, Caserta, Naples. NOAA National Geophysical Data Center, Boulder, Colorado (English)
  3. ↑ Terremoto del 1980 11 23 - Area epicentrale IRPINIA-LUCANIA. Emidius Data Base
  4. ^ Antonello Caporale: Il terremoto infinito. La Repubblica , December 13, 2004
  5. ↑ Tom Behan: The Camorra. Political Criminality in Italy , Routledge Chapman & Hall, London 1996, ISBN 978-0-415-09987-5 (English)
  6. ^ G. Scalera: Seismic hazard in Irpinia and considerations about the seismogenic area. (PDF; 2.3 MB) Annali di Geofisica, Vol. 34, No. 1, 1993

Coordinates: 40 ° 54 '50.4 "  N , 15 ° 21' 57.6"  E