U.S.- Italy Research Workshop on the

Hydrometeorology, Impacts, and Management of Extreme Floods

Perugia (Italy), November 1995

CIVIL PROTECTION PLANNING AND ACTIONS:

THE ROLE OF SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY IN ITALY

L. Ubertini

Institute of Hydraulics

University of Perugia

S.Lucia, 06125 Perugia, Italy

In recent years the Italian scientific community has been giving increased attention under the auspices of the National Research Council to the question of natural hazards. It is a well known fact, as the recent extraordinary event of the upper Po basin in the Piedmont region showed, that the Mediterranean environment, and for that matter Italy, is highly vulnerable to frequent occurrences of natural disasters triggered by large scale atmospheric perturbation, such as floods and landslides. This growing awareness of the vagaries of natural hazards has been confined not only within the walls of research institutions, but a concerted effort has been created to coordinate the activities of prediction, mitigation, and monitoring of many institutions dealing with flood hazards. At the governmental level the Department for Civil Protection, groups together scientific and professional leaders in the various aspects of natural and man-made hazards such as hydrogeological, seismic, volcanic, and nuclear. The research activities are coordinated under competent National Groups for the Prevention of Disasters. This paper deals with the organization of the National Group for Prevention of Hydrogeological Disasters, and its recent major research achievements.