**6. Conclusions**

Snow avalanches are among the most destructive natural hazards threatening built structures, ski resorts, and landscapes in cold and mountainous regions. The Central Apennines high-mountain environment has been largely affected by different types of mass movements in recent years, accentuated in frequency and magnitude due to changes in the climate regime. The increase in temperatures, the irregularity of intense weather events, and several heavy snowfall events determined an increase in landslide and/or snow avalanche hazards, especially in areas with well-developed tourist facilities.

The Prati di Tivo area has been widely affected by several mass movement phenomena. Like other mountain territories of the Abruzzo Region, the study area is not immune to the general increased tourist fruition and related snow avalanche risk. It is located on the northern slope of the Gran Sasso Massif (Central Italy), showing peculiar meteorological and snow characteristics that differ from the rest of the Alps and Central Apennines. This work allowed us to better define and analyze the geomorphological and climatic features of the study area. The climate extremization results in relation to environmental risk reduction were evaluated by combining different thematic datasets (e.g., morphometric and geomorphological features, climatic and nivological data, technical information, and numerical modeling). In detail, we carried out a snow avalanche hazard assessment to

outline a multidisciplinary methodological approach for defining snow avalanche-critical areas and a technical scientific basis to set up accurate civil protection plans and land managemen<sup>t</sup> activities. The analysis was performed following a stepwise methodological approach, including the snow avalanche inventory analysis, the analysis and mapping of snow avalanches' paths, the elaboration of a snow avalanche hazard map, and the definition of numerical models.

Recent exceptional snowfall events in the Abruzzo Region (i.e., January 2017 [75,126,127]) caused several damages and injuries in the surrounding Prati di Tivo area. Consequently, the safety services for ski resorts and facilities were updated by installing 12 Obellx® gas exploders [109] to better manage short-term avalanche risks. However, despite the activation of this risk mitigation protocol, the recent snow avalanche event that occurred on 26 March 2020 testified that the local geomorphological dynamics amplified by the climatic extremization that could lead to approximate and insufficient results deriving from planned safety services. Understanding the likely scenarios and consequences of a changing climate on snow avalanche behavior is essential for planning and managing mountain developments. More specifically, the climatic evolution, characterized by further increases of the average winter temperatures and increasingly more irregular and intense snowfalls, could lead to avalanche events of even greater magnitudes compared to what was observed until now and, consequently, will determine a major need for constant updates of the calculations of the new snow avalanche paths.

Combining and integrating morphometric, geomorphological, climatic, and nivological analyses, it was possible to further advance the methodologies for a snow avalanche hazard assessment, defining the existing relationships between climate extremization and environmental risk in a mass-movement prone area, such as Prati di Tivo area. The resulting data also showed that, to perform a complete snow avalanche hazard assessment, it is necessary to consider the geomorphic role of snow avalanches, which can exert considerable erosive forces extending the contributing areas. Finally, a thorough expert-based study would be highly desirable to constantly evaluate the geomorphological and climatic dynamics of the study area. This kind of study can represent a valuable and operative tool for civil protection activities and territorial planning in relation to emergency managemen<sup>t</sup> and mitigation measures by assuming the potential occurrence of extreme nivological and meteorological scenarios.

**Author Contributions:** Conceptualization, M.F. and E.M.; methodology, M.F. and E.M; software, C.C., M.C., G.E. and G.P.; validation, E.M. and M.F.; investigation, M.F. and E.M; resources, M.C. and M.F.; writing—original draft preparation, G.P., C.C., G.E. and M.F; writing—review and editing, G.P., M.F. and E.M.; supervision, E.M.; project administration, M.F. and E.M.; and funding acquisition, E.M. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** This research and the APC were funded by Enrico Miccadei, the gran<sup>t</sup> provided by Università degli Studi "G. d'Annunzio" Chieti-Pescara.

**Institutional Review Board Statement:** Not applicable.

**Informed Consent Statement:** Not applicable.

**Data Availability Statement:** The data presented in this study are available on request from the author. The data are not publicly available due to privacy. Images employed for the study will be available online for readers.

**Acknowledgments:** The authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewers that helped to improve the manuscript with their precious and constructive comments. The authors wish to thank the Cartographic Office of the Abruzzo Region by means of the Open Geodata Portal (http: //opendata.regione.abruzzo.it/, accessed on 20 December 2020) and the Ministero dell'Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio e del Mare (http://www.minambiente.it/, accessed on 20 December 2020) for providing the topographic and cartographic data used for this work. Climatic and nivological data were provided by the Functional Center and Hydrographic Office of the Abruzzo Region (Centro Funzionale e Ufficio Idrografico Regione Abruzzo) and the Meteomont service (https://www.sian.it/ infoMeteo, accessed on 15 February 2021). The authors are also grateful to the amateur meteorological

association L'Aquila Caput Frigoris (https://www.caputfrigoris.it/, accessed on 12 January 2021) for providing the updated climatic data (year 2020) used for the work.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.
