Which buildings get priority for earthquake control?

“We invest strategically in prevention and our policies at the Ministry of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection will first prevent and then cure,” said the Minister of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection, Vassilis Kikilias, in an interview he granted to “ERT1”, in the context the launch of the mandatory pre-earthquake control program by the ministry in collaboration with the OASP and the TEE.

“First, the critical infrastructures of the country must be checked, i.e. the schools, universities, hospitals, police and fire stations”, noted Mr. Kikilias and added that the “ELECTRONIC BUILDING CENSUS PLATFORM” is already in operation by the OASP , while at the same time, the TEE is taking all the necessary actions for the creation of an “ELECTRONIC REGISTER OF ENGINEERS”, as well as the process of training the engineers in cooperation with the OASP and the Civil Engineers Association of Greece, in order to start immediately after the inventory of the buildings carrying out the checks.

“We aspire to have 80% of the checks implemented within the next six to eight months,” said Mr. Kikilias, stressing that two engineers will go to each site for a primary check, which he said means that “if and as long as these expert scientists find that there is a problem somewhere, the control will be done secondarily and then we will proceed with the necessary actions”.

“We are an earthquake-prone region and given that the first Anti-Seismic Regulation was implemented in Greece in 1959, this process is an important gift for the State and of course part of prevention, something that the Prime Minister has also requested”, pointed out the Minister of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection.

“It is the first time where a clear framework of immediate pre-earthquake control is established with mandatory implementation, while funding has been secured from the Recovery and Resilience Fund in the amount of 32.5 million euros for the implementation of the project”, he underlined.

Finally, regarding the event for Marietta Giannakou, Mr. Kikilias emphasized that she was “a great political personality of the Center-Right, a modern woman, pioneer, scientist, politician, with a strong opinion. I’ll say it simply, she never watered down her wine, she said things as they were, with whatever political cost this had”, adding that even this part of her personal difficulties was faced with bravado, with courage and with excess soul.

Source: RES-MPE