L’Aquila and Gran Sasso scientists try to recover from earthquake

MAY 20, 2009

Physics Today

Nature News : The University of L’Aquila , Italy, was mostly destroyed by a magnitude-6.3 earthquake on 6 April. Fifty-five students were among the 295 people who died in the quake. Only two buildings on the university’s two out-of-town campuses remain structurally sound, but it will still take a few months to make them habitable. The rest are substantially damaged, some to the point of no repair.

Six weeks later, with 70% of its staff homeless, the 23,000-student university is starting to work again--in tents or in buildings loaned by other towns. The underground particle-physics laboratory at Gran Sasso , which remained undamaged 15 kilometers from L’Aquila, resumed work on 4 May, even though 90% of its staff are homeless.

The L’Aquila physics faculty found a relatively easy solution by moving into the above-ground facilities of the Gran Sasso laboratories, where many homeless staff also sleep. “Of course there will be crowding -- and it will be for some years,” says Gran Sasso director Eugenio Coccia. “But we are glad to be able to have such a role.

It has not been easy to find the mental energy to think about science in the circumstances, admits Gran Sasso physicist Francesco Arneodo. “With so many homeless it is hard to focus your full attention on research,” he says, the strain clear on his face. “But now it is OK—we are back!”