A decade after earthquake, Italy's Amatrice struggles to rebuild

In the early hours of August 24, 2016, Giorgio Cortellesi stumbled through the dust and darkness of Amatrice, fearing his children were dead, buried beneath tons of rubble.

His two young sons had been staying overnight with their grandparents when an earthquake levelled much of the central Italian hilltown.

Rushing over from a nearby hamlet, Cortellesi found the streets in ruins, muffled cries rising from collapsed homes. Then he caught the sound of one of his sons calling for help.

"I didn't think I would find them alive, but when I heard his voice, it was as if I started breathing again," said Cortellesi.

He promised himself that if his boys survived he would help rebuild Amatrice, which bore the brunt of the calamity, with 237 people dying in the town out of a total death toll of 303.

Elected town mayor in 2021, Cortellesi is trying to make good on his pledge, but it isn't easy.

The 6.2-magnitude earthquake and aftershocks destroyed much of Amatrice's historic centre and many outlying areas, leaving several thousand people homeless.

The state has promised to pay for the vast bulk of the reconstruction and has so far approved private and public sector projects worth €22.7 billion ($26.3 billion) across the disaster zone. Around €10 billion has been paid out to date.

In Amatrice, 38% of the damaged properties have been restored, with the pace of building picking up markedly over the past 12 months. Cranes dot the town and clusters of pristine new homes have sprouted amidst the desolation.

Even so, only a small proportion of the structures flattened in 2016 have been rebuilt. Much of the historic centre remains behind barriers, where two lone towers that survived the earthquake gaze over the blasted wasteland.

Around 1,000 people, roughly 60% of the population, still live in small, prefabricated shelters, while each year a few families drift away, seeking a brighter future elsewhere.

"After 10 years many people have lost faith," said Cortellesi. "We need to keep on encouraging them, but we can't do more than we are already doing."

As with other major Italian earthquakes, such as L'Aquila in 2009, Amatrice's reconstruction got bogged down in bureaucracy, legal disputes and shifting priorities.

The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted rebuilding efforts, while Italy's generous "Superbonus" renovation scheme, intended to revive the virus-hit economy, pushed up the cost of building materials and siphoned off labour to more lucrative projects across Italy.