Preventive measures against earthquake damage to museum collections: The recuperation of the exhibits at the Lorca archaeological museum
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.21701/bolgeomin.123.4.010Keywords:
cultural heritage, deterioration, earthquake, Lorca, natural disaster, preventive conservationAbstract
As a result of the earthquake on 11 May 2011 the Lorca municipal archaeological museum suffered serious damage to its structure and its exhibits. The lack of preventive measures and the inadequacy of steps taken before the earthquake aggravated the severity of damage. We have assessed the damage to the exhibits and analysed the causes that exacerbated the impact of the seismic movement. We also describe the work carried out by the Institute of Spain’s Cultural Heritage (IPCE) to recuperate the collections and detail the measures and general criteria for the prevention and minimization of damage that the museum must implement to reduce the damage to its collections to a minimum during any subsequent earthquakes.
Downloads
References
Feilden, B.M. 1987. Entre dos terremotos. Los Bienes Culturales en zonas sísmicas. ICCROM – The Getty Institute, 24/04/12, http://www.getty.edu/conservation/publications_resources/pdf_publications/entre_dos.pdf.
ICCROM-UNESCO 2009. Manual de Gestión de Riesgo de Colecciones, 12/04/12, http://unesdoc.unesco.org/Ulis/cgi-bin/ulis.pl?catno=186240&set=4B13E242_1_32&database =new1&gp=0&mode=e&ll=r.
IPCE, 2011. Plan Nacional de Conservación Preventiva, 03/05/12, http://www.mcu.es/patrimonio/docs/MC/IPHE/PlanesNac/PLAN_NACIONAL_CONSERVACION_PREVEN TIVA.pdf.
Martínez Rodríguez, A. 2011. El Museo Arqueológico Municipal de Lorca (Murcia) tras los terremotos del 11 de mayo de 2011. La Alberca 9, 277-294.
Menegazzi, C. 2010. disaster risk management of cultural heritage. Tesis doctoral, Università degli studi della Tuscia, Viterbo, 520 pp.
Ministerio de Cultura, 2009: Guía para un Plan de Protección de Colecciones ante Emergencias, 12/04/12, http://www.mcu.es/museos/docs/MC/CERES/Guia_plan_proteccion_colecciones.pdf.
Ministerio de Fomento, 2010: Mapa de peligrosidad sísmica en España. Periodo de retorno 500 años. Instituto Geográfico Nacional,13/04/12, http://www.ign.es/ign/layoutIn/sismoDetalleMapasSismicos.do?mapa=peligrosidadintensidades_peq.jpg&titulo=...peligrosidadintensidades.jpg.
Ministerio del Interior. 2007. Real Decreto 393/2007, de 23 de marzo, por el que se aprueba la Norma Básica de Autoprotección de los centros, establecimientos y dependencias dedicados a actividades que puedan dar origen a situaciones de emergencia. BoE, 24 de marzo de 2007.
Podany, J. 2009: Seismic Damage Mitigation for Museum Collections: Three decades of seismic mitigation at the J. Paul Getty Museum. Economic Implications of Cultural Heritage Challenges: Climate Change, disasters Management, and Sustainability. The World Bank, 32 pp.
Podany, J. (Ed) 2008. Advances in the Protection of Museum Collections from Earthquake Damage. Papers from a Symposium Held at the J. Paul Getty Museum at the Villa on May 3-4, 2006. Getty Publications, 240 pp.
VVAA. 2009. Before the Unthinkable Happens Again. International Roundtable Discussion. The National Museum of Western Art /International Institute for the Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (IIC), 23 pp, 13/04/12, http://www.iiconservation.org/sites/default/files/dialogues/seismic-en.pdf.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
© CSIC. Manuscripts published in both the print and online versions of this journal are the property of the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, and quoting this source is a requirement for any partial or full reproduction.
All contents of this electronic edition, except where otherwise noted, are distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) licence. You may read the basic information and the legal text of the licence. The indication of the CC BY 4.0 licence must be expressly stated in this way when necessary.
Self-archiving in repositories, personal webpages or similar, of any version other than the final version of the work produced by the publisher, is not allowed.
