The legal aftershocks of the earthquake in L'Aquila, Italy

Science is in the dock in Italy as local witnesses finally confront the earthquake experts on trial for manslaughter who, it is alleged, failed to warn them of the risks.

Nuns walk past the ruins of a building after the earthquake on April 6, 2009 in L'Aquila, Italy - The legal aftershocks of the earthquake at L'Aquila

Nuns walk past the ruins of a building after the earthquake on April 6, 2009 in L'Aquila, Italy Photo: AFP/GETTY IMAGES

By Michael Day

22 Nov 2011

On the evening of April 5 2009, surgeon Vincenzo Vittorini made a decision that he will rue for the rest of his life. He chose to obey the advice of scientific experts instead of the voice in his head telling him to grab his wife, Claudia, and young daughter Fabrizia and flee their apartment in the medieval mountain city of L'Aquila in central Italy. A 3.9 magnitude tremor had just shaken the earthquake-prone city, terrifying residents, and prompting many of the older ones to leave their homes to spend a chilly yet secure night in the piazza.

But Dr Vittorini recalled the official advice from just five days before, assuring residents that the series of small shocks the city was experiencing was evidence of seismic energy dissipating, not building. So he eschewed traditional practices and stayed at home with his family. Then at 3.23am on April 6, a huge 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck L'Aquila and the surrounding area, killing more than 300 people and destroying thousands of buildings. Dr Vittorini remembers little apart from being pulled from the wreckage of his apartment. His wife and daughter did not survive.

With other citizens, he has formed the group "309 martyrs" to represent the victims and their families, many of whom are now taking centre stage in a historic trial in which science itself is in the dock and which has become a cause célèbre for the international research community.

The campaigners point to a now notorious press conference, given just days before the L'Aquila quake – but significantly, after numerous smaller tremors – in which Bernardo De Bernardinis, the deputy head of the technical division of Italy's Civil Protection Agency, responded casually to a rhetorical question asking whether residents should simply sit back with a glass of wine. "Absolutely," he said – a Montepulciano D.O.C", adding there was "no danger" because the small shocks indicated that a "continuous discharge of energy" was occurring.

Now Mr De Bernardinis, and six other Italian earthquake experts, including Enzo Boschi, then president of the National Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology, and Giulio Selvaggi, director of the National Earthquake Centre, are on trial for manslaughter because of the assurances given before the earthquake hit. Prior to the press conference, the seven had met to discuss the risk to the city. Prosecutors say they should have provided a clearer indication of the danger, and the additional risk posed by the city's frail medieval architecture. All seven deny any wrong-doing or negligence.

The trial is set to continue well into next year. Should the men be found guilty – they could face up to 15 years in prison. The virtual certainty that they will use one or both of their chances to appeal, means a definitive guilty verdict would be several years away.

The reaction from the wider international scientific community to the decision to bring them to trial has been swift and damning, however. Rick Aster, the president of the Seismological Society of America, says the court case "is unprecedented and reflects a misunderstanding of the science of earthquakes".

"Despite decades of scientific research in Italy and in the rest of the world, it is not yet possible to accurately and consistently predict the timing, location, and magnitude of earthquakes," he says.

Patrick McSharry, head of Oxford University's Catastrophe Risk Financing Centre, agrees: "Blaming the scientists for their failure to predict the L'Aquila earthquake is like a medieval witch-hunt."

And the American Geophysical Union warns the trial will have long-term consequences for seismology. "harming international efforts to understand natural disasters and mitigate associated risk, because risk of litigation will discourage scientists and officials from advising their government or even working in the field of seismology and seismic risk".

Not all observers – indeed not all scientists – agree that the trial is a travesty. While the consensus is that seismologists cannot predict exactly when and where an earthquake will strike, these critics say that Italy's expert seismologists and officials did fail the people of L'Aquila.

According to some seismologists, the occurrence of 400 or so small shocks raised the chances of a major earthquake in the next few days by a factor of 100 or perhaps 1,000, even though the actual chance of such a quake occurring remained low – perhaps just one in 1,000.

Dr McSharry notes that in absolute terms the danger had not increased by very much. "The risk of an earthquake would have been extremely low to start with," he says. "After the tremors, this risk would have been increased but this is still unlikely to have been sufficient to take action. The decision about whether or not to take action hinges on an accurate real-time risk assessment and an appropriate cost-benefits analysis."

It is this "risk" and "cost-benefits analysis'' that some say should have been communicated to the public.

"The public has a right to know about this kind of information," according to Prof David Spiegelhalter, Winton Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk, at Cambridge University. "To suggest otherwise is patronising."

"Coming clean with what you know is now being demanded by the public," agrees Prof Tom Jordan, director of the Southern California Earthquake Center. While he believes that the manslaughter charges have "no merit", he says events at L'Aquila would "force seismologists worldwide to rethink the way they describe low-probability, high-risk events".

Scientists are not known for their communication skills, and many are suspicious of journalists, fearing that reporters' dislike of caveats and nuance will compromise the accuracy of scientific messages they provide to the public. Prof Spiegelhalter argues that special expertise is needed in communicating such sensitive and complex information. "When you're explaining risk to the public it's vital that you have the training to do it properly." Input from psychologists and social scientists is essential.

"I don't believe that the public is too stupid to understand the difference between absolute and increased risk. And this could and should have been explained to locals who, as veterans of an earthquake zone, would have been a sophisticated audience. Given all the information, they would have been in the position to decide whether or not it was worth sleeping in the town square for a few nights."

David Ropeik, who teaches risk management at Harvard University, agrees: "Emotional and psychological factors heavily influence the way people interpret risk – and how they react. It's vital that these factors are considered and that people with expertise in these fields help inform the way authorities communicate risk to the public."

This applies not only to earthquakes and other natural disasters (tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, avalanches etc) but to extreme weather situations, too. And explaining how the benefits of medication may come at the cost of a small but quantifiable increased risk from illnesses is another area where greater expertise is needed (see below).

This shortfall in information was identified in June this year by experts from Zurich University's Horten-Center for patient-oriented research and knowledge transfer; they called for GPs to be trained in risk communication after observing the degree to which they were largely unable to explain important cardiac risk data to patients.

That's not to say special circumstances don't sometimes complicate matters further. In L'Aquila prior to the major quake there were the assertions by a self-proclaimed earthquake expert of an imminent disaster. Gioacchino Giuliani, a technician at the National Institute of Nuclear Physics, near to the town, claimed that local radon measurements were indicative of a significant quake. Indeed, there is a widespread feeling that the expert meeting and press conference on March 31 was largely a propaganda exercise designed to counter what were – and largely still are – regarded as baseless claims.

But advocates for better risk communication say these claims could have been countered, too, by honest explanation of the real increased risk based on the known science.

Mr Ropeik says: "The expert panel took their communication responsibilities too casually. But because no-one involved in informing the public at L'Aquila had that ability or mindset, the scientists defaulted to their normal culture, that is, not talking to the public."

Some commentators have argued that it was the responsibility of public officials and not scientists to inform the residents of L'Aquila of the risk. Others, including Prof Spiegelhalter, argue it was incumbent on both to see that the public was properly informed rather than simply reassured.

"If they had sat down and gone through the commission's discussions with members of the public or briefed a few reporters, then they probably wouldn't be on trial now," says Mr Ropeik.

For Dr Vittorini, who lost his wife and daughter – he has a son who was away when the quake struck – the high-profile legal process may provide some small comfort. "I hope that this trial will change mindsets and will lead to greater attention given to communicating risk," says Dr Vittorini. "No one expected to be told the exact time of the quake. We just wanted to be warned that we were sitting on a bomb."