'Fragile' ground threatens landslides, flooding in Italy

About 28 million people in more than 80 percent of Italy's municipalities are at risk of landslides and flooding due to fragile ground, officials said. ANBI, Italy's national reclamation, irrigation and land improvement association, said hydrogeological instability exposes about 1.26 million buildings to the threat of landslides or flooding, including more than 6,000 schools and 531 hospitals, the country's ANSA news agency reported Friday. The ANBI study said more than 9,000 people died and 700,000 were still homeless as a result of landslides or floods between 1950 and 2012, costing the country billions of euros in economic damages. The problem required a ''civil protection culture'' to create ''the most transparent, effective and economical'' way of tackling the risks, ANBI President Massimo Gargano said. He proposed a plan involving 3,400 interventions and total costs estimated at $9.6 billion to reduce the present instability, ANSA reported.