The DRIFT project, Building Classification and Rapid Vulnerability Evaluation in Post-Earthquake Reconnaissance

Dr Marianna Ercolino, Aralia Systems & Brunel University London

DRIFT is an international, Eureka funded, methodological framework for post-earthquake building classification and vulnerability evaluation. The project combines expertise in 3D reconstruction with AI-assisted classification, satellite remote sensing and techniques of rapid repair of damaged buildings. Dr Marianna Ercolino, senior lecturer in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Brunel University of London is the Principal Investigator for the project; Aralia Systems Ltd is the UK industrial partner. The UK component of the project is funded and monitored by Innovate UK. There are partner DRIFT organisations in both Türkiye and South Korea. DRIFT is primarily designed to support the allocation of emergency response resources following an earthquake; it has attracted the attention of organisations such as the World Monument Fund as the reconnaissance techniques are directly applicable to the heritage sector. The presentation will consist of two parts: A presentation by Dr Ercolino describing the methodology behind DRIFT and how it seeks to improve the quality and speed of post-earthquake reconnaissance. This will be an abbreviated version of the presentation to be given at ECEE 2026, the 18th European Conference on Earthquake Engineering. A presentation by Aralia Systems describing the sensors, 3D, AI classification techniques used by DRIFT, and the software architecture of the system which is based on PostGIS/PostgreSQL.

The discussion will present new methods for building damage assessment to the heritage community. The DRIFT project has recently commenced; there is an opportunity for Aralia to align the DRIFT database architecture with that of ARCHES in a way that would be beneficial to all users. The Developers Conference is an ideal forum to discuss those design features that will facilitate interoperability.

The audience includes end users, researchers and developers.

The interface will give ARCHES users access to a comprehensive suite of earthquake damage collection and assessment tools, together with an archive of data with known provenance.