preventive checkswhich existed until now in public buildings, become mandatory informed Efthymyos Lekkasprofessor of geology and president of the Earthquake Planning and Defense Organization.

The decision was made following a workshop in St. Maximos Palace with the object of direct pre-seismic control on seismic protection and durability of public buildings.

“With this initiative, primary and secondary inspections are becoming mandatory in all public buildings, starting with schools and hospitals,” said Mr. Lekkas.

As he explained, “primary and secondary inspections started in the 2000s, but they were optional, resulting in only 16,000–17,000 of the 80,000 public buildings in the broader public sector that we have in Greece buildings.

Primary control has been carried out, and this database exists in the Agency for Planning and Protection from Earthquakes.

So far, despite our calls for primary and secondary inspections, the percentage of buildings that are inspected each year has generally been very small.

Buildings and earthquake rules

“30% of the buildings on the territory were built taking into account the new modern anti-seismic regime.” These buildings are not in danger. Hence 30% of buildings built from -69 to -84. These buildings, which were built in accordance with the 1959 earthquake rules, have no problem, unless they have been broken into, if they are not maintained, and so on.

From 1959 and earlier, we have buildings that are not subject to the rules, just before 1959 there were some rules from the state. These buildings are prioritized for inspection. It’s not that they’re dangerous buildings, but we need to look at the level of performance, such as the level of seismic protection, so that we can statically improve these buildings that were built before 1959.

As he emphasized, we should cover the remaining 30,000 buildings with preliminary seismic checks, as well as the 25,000 already checked, because this does not mean that the building is checked and considered safe in the long term. Every 5-10 years we have to re-examine the buildings so that we can establish their anti-seismic suitability.

Source: ERT