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Landslide Vulnerability Criteria: A Case Study from Umbria, Central Italy

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Abstract

Little is known about the vulnerability to landslides, despite landslides causing frequent and widespread damage to the population and the built-up environment in many areas of the world. Lack of information about vulnerability to landslides limits our ability to determine landslide risk. This paper provides information on the vulnerability of buildings and roads to landslides in Umbria, central Italy. Information on 103 landslides of the slide and slide-earth flow types that have resulted in damage to buildings and roads at 90 sites in Umbria is used to establish dependencies between the area of the landslide and the vulnerability to landslides. The dependencies obtained are applied in the hills surrounding the town of Collazzone, in central Umbria, an area for which a detailed landslide inventory map is available. By exploiting the landslide inventory and the established vulnerability curves, the geographical distribution of the vulnerability to landslides is mapped and statistics of the expected damage are calculated. Reliability and limits of the vulnerability thresholds and of the obtained vulnerability assessment are discussed.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank their colleagues at CNR IRPI in Perugia for contributing to the collection of information on landslide damage in Umbria, and for the preparation of the landslide inventory map for the Collazzone area. The research was conducted in projects E2-C2, Extreme Events Causes and Consequences, and PREVIEW, Prevention, Information and Early Warning pre-operational Services to Support the Management of Risks, funded by the European Commission 6th Framework Programme. CNR GNDCI publication n. 2910.

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  1. CNR–IRPI, via Madonna Alta 126, 06128, Perugia, Italy

    Mirco Galli & Fausto Guzzetti

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  1. Mirco Galli
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Correspondence to Mirco Galli.

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Galli, M., Guzzetti, F. Landslide Vulnerability Criteria: A Case Study from Umbria, Central Italy. Environmental Management 40, 649–665 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00267-006-0325-4

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