PSI - Issue 84

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ScienceDirect

Procedia Structural Integrity 84 (2026) 583–590

III Fabre Conference: Existing Bridges, Viaducts, and Tunnels: Research, Innovation, and Applications Large-scale Hydrological-Hydraulic Modeling for Infrastructure Design in Unmapped Basins: the RESCUE_SAT Project Luciano Pavesi d *, Francesco Bella a , Andrea Benedetto a , Luca Bianchini Ciampoli a , Stefano Cipollini a , Fabrizio D’Amico a , Aldo Fiori a , Valerio Gagliardi a , Richard Mwangi a,b , Antonio Napolitano a,b , Irene Pomarico a , Patrizia Sacco c , Deodato Tapete c , Alessandro Ursi c , Maria Virelli c , Antonio Zarlenga a , Elena Volpi a a Department of Civil, Computer Science and Aeronautical Technologies Engineering, Roma Tre University, Via Vito Volterra 62, 00146 Rome, Italy b Department of Civil, Constructional and Environmental Engineering, University La Sapienza, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184, Rome, Italy c Italian Space Agency (ASI), Via del Politecnico, 00133 Rome, Italy d Department of Civil Engineering and Computer Science, University of Rome Tor Vergata, Via Politecnico 1, 00133, Rome, Italy Abstract Flood events are becoming increasingly frequent and severe due to climate change, posing significant threats to ecosystems, human settlements, and critical infrastructure. One of the most critical challenges in this context concerns the safety verification of hydraulic crossing structures (e.g., bridges and culverts) located in small or unmapped basins, often excluded from official flood risk assessments developed by river basin authorities. Currently, as required by Italian national regulations (e.g., guidelines issued by the National Agency for the Safety of Railways and Road and Motorway Infrastructures – ANSFISA), the design peak discharge is assessed for such structures. However, this estimate often relies on outdated and highly empirical approaches, which may not ensure a consistent or physically meaningful evaluation of hydraulic risk. To address this issue, the RESCUE_SAT project, developed in collaboration with the Italian Space Agency (ASI) under the “I4DP_SCIENCE” initiative (Agreement no. 2025-2-HB.0 between ASI and the University of Roma Tre), proposes a novel methodology based on a

* Corresponding author. E-mail address: luciano.pavesi.609286@uniroma2.eu

2452-3216 © 2026 The Authors. Published by ELSEVIER B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0) Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the Conference 10.1016/j.prostr.2026.06.075