6 th International Conference on Earthquake Geotechnical Engineering 1-4 November 2015 Christchurch, New Zealand The contribution of EUROSEISTEST and building monitoring arrays in Earthquake Early Warning and Rapid Damage Assessment in Thessaloniki Z. Roumelioti 1 , S. Karapetrou 2 , M. Manakou 3 , K. Pitilakis 4 , D. Raptakis 5 , D. Bindi 6 and T. Boxberger 7 ABSTRACT We present initial results from the incorporation of strong motion data from instrumented sites and buildings in the area of Thessaloniki in a recently established Earthquake Early Warning (EEW) and rapid damage assessment system. Data from structures monitoring networks are repeatedly processed to compute up-to-date fragility curves, taking into account the actual state of the buildings (e.g. ageing effects of the construction materials, possible pre-existing damages, changes in geometry and mass distribution). In the case of an earthquake alert message, the expected (or on-site recorded, if available) peak ground acceleration value is combined with the building- specific fragility curve to provide a rapid assessment of the most probable level of damage during strong ground shaking. Off-line testing with data from past earthquakes, widely felt in Thessaloniki, provide satisfactory results. Introduction Exposure and vulnerability of modern cities to earthquake hazard lead to an emerging need for developing operational frameworks that can be used by the authorities (e.g. civil protection, medical services, public building administrators, industry) to establish decision making procedures and risk mitigation strategies. An Earthquake Early Warning (EEW) and rapid damage assessment system, which detects imminent strong shaking and provides alerts on the expected level of damage on a building-specific and structure-specific scale in general, could prompt actions toward the protection of life and property. Even if “lead time” of such an alert, i.e. the period from the moment of alert issuing until the moment of strong shaking, is too short to prompt actions, even automatic ones, end users still acknowledge the usefulness of the service toward situation awareness. The effectiveness of such rapid systems greatly depends on the amount and quality of available real-time data of ground shaking. This leads to a need of maximum engagement of already existing networks, such as permanent monitoring stations and special networks, as for example for building and lifelines monitoring. 1 Dr, Department of Civil Engineering, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece, zroum@auth.gr 2 MSc, Dept. of Civil Eng., Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece, gkarapet@civil.auth.gr 3 Dr, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece, manakou@civil.auth.gr 4 Prof., Dept. of Civil Engineering, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece, kpitilak@civil.auth.gr 5 Assoc. Prof., Dept. of Civil Eng., Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece, raptakis@civil.auth.gr 6 Dr, Helmholtz Centre, GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, Germany, bindi@gfz-potsdam.de 7 MSc, Helmholtz Centre, GFZ, Potsdam, Germany, tobias.boxberger@gfz-potsdam.de