Did anybody watch the History Channel documentary on SF earthquake?

[WI_DEM]

and how a quake of that magnitude could destroy the city again? of course, hopefully the problems with fire won't be as severe, but it was pretty scary. I LOVE San Francisco and would hate to see all the carnage and death which potentially could occur. Also, the pukes would have a field day with the fanatics saying that God brought wrath on the city because of its high gay population. What was really scary is that the documentary said that up until the mid 50's there was no earthquake code in place for buildings and that a lot of older buildings would be particularly at risk in less affluent areas.

Did you think that they over stated the danger? Actually given all the fault lines throughout California--the state as a whole could see severe damage in Northern and Southern California.

[RaleighNCDUer]

1. Let's not forget all the building that's been done on fill in the bay.

It seems solid enough, but it will liquify with a strong quake - there were signs of that in the '89(?) quake, and that was only a 5 something, IIRC.

[megatherium]

17. The '89 quake was 6.9. The 1906 quake was 30 times bigger. nt

[RaleighNCDUer]

19. 6.9? I thought it was 5.9 or something like that. A magnitude

smaller.

Shows how memory can trick you.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

22. Yes.

It was specifically responsible for the buildings that fell over in the Marina, and played a large part in the collapse of the old Nimitz viaduct in Oakland.

[Pastiche423]

34. In October 1989

I learned very quickly what was land fill, what was hard mud and what was rock after the 6.9 quake.

I lived in an apartment on the edge of land fill/hard mud. W/the exception of inside damage, my building scored a GREEN, while directly across the street, a large condo building was moved eight inches off its foundation, a YELLOW.

The Marina District (my neighborhood) was heavily damaged from the quake and the fires that followed. I still have photos I took, but haven't been scanned. It was surreal.

Any rebuilding had to be done w/strict updated EQ codes.

[liberalhistorian]

2. No, I didn't see it, but I sure

wish I had! Today is the 100th anniversary of the earthquake; that's hard to believe.

I remember studying it in a little more depth, on my own, back in school because the short blurb we were taught didn't at all satisfy my curiosity. I remember how shocked I was at the utter, total devastation and loss that occured. And how the city's spirit ultimately managed to overcome all of that and rise again.

[SoCalDem]

3. Mother Nature has been trying to shrug us off forever

Not stopping anytime soon :scared:

[xmas74]

4. I missed that one.

I did some reading on it back in school a number of years ago. It piqued my interest at the time since we were doing drills for our faultline (New Madrid, which hasn't gone like they promised us twenty years ago).

[RaleighNCDUer]

26. Don't worry. It will.

It's overdue.

[xmas74]

32. I know.

Let's see if we get the big one in my lifetime that will destroy Memphis and parts of St. Louis like they are promising.

[MadMaddie]

5. I watched it...I also have read books about many of the

major disasters that have happened in the US....during the 1908? earthquake the city was devastated.....the populations was quite a bit less than it is now...I don't think they overstated the danger....I think that it is inevitable that another major quake will happen.....the question is will any of the retrofitting of the buildings work as predicted? People that live in apartment buildings especially older ones will be in grave danger....shoddy construction....

If I remember correctly San Francisco is sitting directly on top of the fault line...and many of the buildings are still sitting on soft soil(which is the refuse from the 1908 earthquake)...the kind that will liquify during a major quake...

The religious will say that any event is the wrath of God because of Gays or whatever topic they are eager about...the fact is it's science...you build on top of fault lines..earthquakes will happen, if you happen to live in Tornado Alley....Tornados are going to hit....if you live in the Gulf....Hurricanes will hit.....

Actually I wouldn't call it Gods wrath I would call it Gods hand in mother nature.....

[RaleighNCDUer]

33. "Gods hand in mother nature"?

Sounds dirty.

;)

[Alleycat]

6. No wanted to but

I got sucked into the Quest for the Yeti with Jeff Corwin. The Himalayas are one of my dream destinations and I have a irrational lure to the whole yeti bigfoot legend.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

25. Yeti?

San Francisco has hippies. They're almost like yetis.

[Alleycat]

27. HA

I guess I could've killed two birds with one stone then.

[LeftyMom]

7. Not all over Northern CA

I've lived in Sacramento my whole life and I've never even *felt* an earthquake. There aren't any fault lines anyplace near here.

[Taverner]

8. Yep - the bay area is actually two seperate tectonic plates

Moving in opposite directions from each other.

[MsKandice01]

11. Yes, the Central Valley is the "safest" part of CA

Earthquake-wise.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

21. Unfortunately, it's the most dangerous part...

...freeper-wise. :)

[WI_DEM]

12. Thank you for the correction

[NorCalDem]

9. The Hayward fault line

which runs through Oakland and Berkeley (my neighborhood) is predicted to be the spot of the next "big one." The San Andreas runs under SF, that's the one that went in 1906, the Hayward was the '89 quake.

All in all, we're pretty fucked :D

[Ignacio Upton]

18. Well since the Bay Area is in danger while the Central Valley isn't

Is it safe to assume that California will become a red state after "the big one" hits your state?

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

20. A couple of corrections.

The San Andreas actually runs south and west of San Francisco proper. It goes off-shore somewhere in Pacifica and then re-emerges in Marin. The '89 quake was also on the San Andreas, on the section east of Santa Cruz. That's the reason downtown SC got so horribly wrecked.

[Tesha]

23. Data...

http://quake.abag.ca.gov/pickcity.html



Tesha

[Tesha]

24. More data...

http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/earthq3/where2.html



Tesha

[NorCalDem]

31. thanks for correcting me about '89 n/t

[ellenfl]

10. i saw it.

what struck me was how quickly the federal, state and local government responded to the 1906 quake . . . without fema.

ellen fl

[Quiet_Dem_Mom]

15. Me too. Didn't the massive tent refugee center get set up 2 days after?

That's amazing, especially considering the modes of transportation available at the time. The fire departments were still using horse-drawn firetrucks.

[ThoughtCriminal]

13. My grandfather was there in 1906

He was sleeping on a ship tied up at the docks when it hit.

[slackmaster]

14. I consider a repeat to be a certainty

Not necessarily during my lifetime.

[MsKandice01]

29. I just read that the San Andreas goes about 200 years..

So we're in a safe zone there. However, the Hayward Fault is the main concern because it runs directly underneath so many populated areas.

[slackmaster]

30. The 200 years is an average over time

Remember the Parkfield Experiment? That particular segment of the fault was supposed to be relatively predictable. The predicted earthquake came decades late. It could just as easily happen decades early.

No such thing as a "safe zone" in earthquake country.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

16. I missed it. I fell asleep during UFO's of the Bible.

But I did catch a good doc. on PBS of the earthquake.

I wouldn't worry terribly much about San Fransisco. It won't be like in the disaster movies where everything gets flattened. There might be some isolated collapses in the event of an earthquake, but most buildings are up to code and the older buildings are getting retrofitted. The same thing's going on in Seattle. We had a ~7.0 in the olympia area a few years ago and while there was some structural damage, nobody got hurt. Mostly, I'm sure, due to good codes and retrofitting.

If you want to worry about earthquakes, worry about the third world. Look what happened to Bam and Pakistan.

[Caoimhe]

28. I listened to KGO this morning

to the big "memorial" in downtown SFC. It was fascinating listening to the centurians being interviewed by Mayor Newsome about that fateful day and the weeks and years of reconstruction. It was the first major catastrophe that was captured on film by quite a few people who had cameras. There were also many people who met in those tent camps and later married, and many who lost their loves in the earthquake or subsequent fires. They actually dynamited entire blocks of relatively undamaged buildings to create a fire break. FEMA was nonexistent, but food and water and even free tobacco was available within hours for the refugees. It's amazing history and it's hard to believe there are still people alive who remember it! It will happen again, unfortunately.. for that beautiful city. Probably in our lifetime. I read the story of one boy who was born 11 months after the earthquake in 1906, and always talked about how he'd missed the big one, as it was such a big part of San Francisco history. Amazingly enough, he died months before the Loma Prienda earthquake in 1989, so he missed BOTH big ones! His relatives say he is probably in heaven talking to folks about why he had such bad (or good) timing!

Here's the gathering from this morning:



Here's Mayor Newsome charming a quake survivor:



A then and now set of pictures: TOP: A man looks at a damaged section of Mission Street outside the main post office which was ripped up by the force of the great 1906 earthquake in San Francisco. BOTTOM: Same view from 7th Street looking east on Mission Street at the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit building, formerly the main Post Office, April 2006.



and a picture of Market Street between Third and Fourth Streets April 1906: