The relatives of more than 300 people killed in the devastating¹ L’Aquila earthquake asked for £43 million in compensation from seven experts who are accused of manslaughter in failing to give adequate warning about the disaster.

意大利七位地震专家因未能准确预报拉奎拉地区发生的强震而面临过失杀人罪指控。超过300人在地震中遇难。日前，遇难者亲属要求七位专家赔偿4300万英镑损失。

A court in L’Aquila, the mountain city which was devastated² by the 6.3 magnitude quake on April 6, 2009, admitted 70 individuals and organisations as injured parties in the trial, including the city’s council.

The six prominent seismologists（地震学家） and a senior public official are accused of not issuing sufficient warning over the likelihood of a major tremor³ at an emergency meeting six days before the earthquake hit.

The seven defendants⁴ face charges of manslaughter（过失杀人） and unintentionally causing injury, which if proven by the court, could result in prison sentences of up to 15 years.

The decision to prosecute⁵ the experts has caused outrage⁶ in the scientific world, with Italian and international colleagues saying it is impossible to accurately⁷ predict an earthquake.

The Seismological Society of America has described the trial as an unprecedented⁸ legal attack on science.

Only one of the seven defendants was in court — Bernardo De Bernardinis, the then deputy head of Italy’s Civil Protection agency.

“I felt that it was important to be here because this is my home, and also to underline the professionalism and competence⁹（能力，胜任） of other public officials. I’m from Abruzzo, I owe it to the people of the city,” he said.

The prosecution¹⁰ alleges¹¹ that after the experts held an emergency meeting on March 31, 2009, they gave the public only an “approximate, generic¹² and ineffective assessment¹³ of seismic¹⁴ activity risks as well as incomplete, imprecise and contradictory¹⁵ information.”

The experts, part of Italy’s Great Risks commission, issued a memo¹⁶ that day in which they concluded that it was “improbable” that there would be a big earthquake.

That meant, prosecutors¹⁷ say, that as more tremors¹⁸ hit L’Aquila in the days leading up to the quake, tens of thousands of people had been lulled¹⁹ into a false sense of security and did not evacuate²⁰ their homes.

The earthquake reduced much of L’Aquila’s medieval（中世纪的） centre to rubble²¹ and flattened²² surrounding villages, leaving the region, north-east of Rome, looking like a war zone.

After a three-hour hearing, the trial was adjourned²³ to Oct 1.