The effects of L’Aquila earthquake on the St. Gemma church in Goriano Sicoli: part I—damage survey and kinematic analysis

The paper deals with the structural response of the St. Gemma church in the small historical centre of Goriano Sicoli, which was stricken by the 2009 L’Aquila earthquake. This church is a typical example of Abruzzi baroque architecture and is representative of a large population of similar samples belonging to a wide territorial area. A detailed survey of the damages provoked by the earthquake on both the whole church and its main macro-elements is presented. Then, the observed mechanisms are interpreted by the implementation of both linear and non linear kinematic analyses. The comparison between the obtained results and the occurred seismic demand allows to justify the revealed state of damage and to prove the reliability of the proposed evaluation procedure. In the companion paper, the main outcomes of a FEM response spectrum analysis are presented in order to investigate the structural vulnerability of the church through a detailed analysis of the local stress distribution.