NHESSD Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences Discussions NHESSD Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss. 2195-9269 Göttingen, Germany 10.5194/nhess-2016-78 Maintenance and risk management of rockfall protection net fences through numerical study of deteriorations Luciani Andrea https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7776-6421 1 Barbero Monica 2 Martinelli Daniele 1 Peila Daniele 1 Department of Environment, Land and Infrastructure Engineering, Politecnico di Torino, Turin, 10129, Italy Department of Structural, Geotechnical and Building Engineering, Politecnico di Torino, 5 Turin, 10129, Italy 24 03 2016 2016 1 12 Copyright: © 2016 Andrea Luciani et al. 2016 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This article is available from https://nhess.copernicus.org/preprints/nhess-2016-78/ The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://nhess.copernicus.org/preprints/nhess-2016-78/nhess-2016-78.pdf

Rockfall protection net fences are key protection systems in mountainous areas worldwide to ensure the safety of infrastructures, roads and urban areas against rockfall. Management of the maintenance of rockfall protection net fences is fundamental for public administrations in order to guarantee risk mitigation. This paper deals with the assessment of the installation problems and deterioration of rockfall protection net fences, using numerical modelling in order to evaluate the influence of these issues on their behaviour. A percentage of the residual efficiency is assessed as a useful tool for risk analysis and maintenance planning.