Prior to coming to UC San Diego, Prof. Palermo was a professor in structural Engineering at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand, which he joined in 2009. He started his career in 2005 as Assistant Professor at Politecnico di Milano. Prof. Palermo has three patents, over 400 publications in international journals and conference proceedings mainly related to concrete and precast concrete bridges, timber buildings and seismic resilient low-damage systems. He is a member of several associations and is a Fellow of the International Association of Bridge and Structural Engineering (IABSE), Engineering New Zealand, the New Zealand Society of Earthquake Engineering (NZSEE). He served as President of the Concrete NZ Learned Society in 2021-2022 and New Zealand Head Delegate of the fib (Federation International du Beton) in 2015-2023. He is a passionate teacher and received several awards at the University of Canterbury. In 2021, he was awarded as the “Most Influential International Accelerated Bridge Construction Person of the Year Outside U.S.” in Academia at the 2021 Accelerated Bridge Construction Conference in Miami.
On 14 August 2018, the Ponte Morandi, part of the Polcevera Viaduct in Genoa, Italy, partially collapsed without warning killing 43 people. Despite starting to show signs of deterioration in the 1990s and a number of proposals to replace the bridge in the intervening years, few initiatives were undertaken in a meaningful manner. The presentation explores the background and design philosophy for the Genoa bridge, overviews the construction and design of the bridge and highlights the possible causes of the collapse. The last part of the presentation shows the demolition and the reconstruction of the new bridge built in almost one year. Some lessons learnt are finally discussed and contextualised to any existing bridge.