Like Nepal, and unlike California, we live in a tectonic plate crumple zone. Here are 3 maps that zoom into our neighborhood, showing the risks. At a broad level, California and Oregon are shoving us into Canada:
That crumple action means you can expect one of 3 types of earthquakes here. The most frequent and least serious type are like the 2001 Nisqually quake- deep underground with movement that will knock over brick chimneys, topple TV’s, and maybe collapse aging viaducts or a building in Pioneer Square. The second type is a magnitude 9 mega quake that will happen when the Cascadia Subduction Zone off the coast moves, similar to what happened in Japan. If that goes you will feel very long lasting and powerful waves from side to side, with most of the danger being to older, taller structures, plus tsunami flood zones along the coast. Finally, the most dangerous type of quake here in Seattle is a shallow quake nearby, most obviously along the Seattle Fault, with violent shaking leveling older buildings in large numbers:
The Seattle Fault most catastrophically ruptured in AD 900, causing West Seattle to rise up by 20 feet relative to Wallingford and triggering tsunamis in Puget Sound. Regardless of the type of quake, Wallingford is fairly lucky compared to other parts of Seattle. We are not in a slide zone and are not on top of an old lake bed that is likely to liquify during the quake, so we won’t suffer from the worst amplified shaking:
In theory our earthquake communication hubs are Lower Woodland Park, the Good Shepherd Center, and History House down in Fremont. I expect my communications hub will be my back yard plus a transistor radio, or if things get really ugly then the satellite radio in my car, and my camping gear will help with the rest.
The building boom in Seattle has its blessings, because prior to 1980 there were no earthquake building codes in Seattle at all, and it wasn’t until 1992 that the Seattle Fault was discovered. As we watch 45th and Stone Way get plowed under, it’s worth being thankful that those old single story brick buildings are being torn down before being subjected to a major earthquake.
My understanding is that our public schools are up to code except for Lincoln, which is slated for a rebuild in 2019, but many private schools are not up to code as there’s no system forcing upgrades like there are in public schools. We went on a tour of a fancy private school and were surprised that nobody even knew if their charming 100 year old brick building had been retrofit. Even the real estate agents I speak with say that earthquake readiness doesn’t register with buyers, much less renters.
In general, retrofits are a lot less effective than new construction. Retrofits bolt houses to foundations and roofs to houses, but they typically don’t insert shear walls and other stuff that happens in new construction. So if you live in a charming old bungalow you may wish to befriend the Amazon employee in the modern McMansion next door so that they will let you in after the big one hits and it’s 40 degrees and raining outside.
Here’s standard preparedness things to be aware of:
- Make sure everyone who stays in the house alone knows how to turn off mains for gas, electricity, and water
- Attach stuff to walls so it doesn’t topple
- Have first aid supplies and a fire extinguisher at the ready
- Retrofit your home if it hasn’t been done already
- Be ready for a week of being unsupported by society- no groceries, no fresh water, no medical care, no electricity or communications
Nearly one million people have been killed by earthquakes since 2000. Here is the list of quakes that have killed at least 20,000 people in the last 15 years:
| Date | Location | Deaths | Magnitude |
| 3/11/2011 | Japan | 20,896 | 9 |
| 1/12/2010 | Haiti region | 316,000 | 7 |
| 5/12/2008 | Eastern Sichuan, China | 87,587 | 7.9 |
| 10/8/2005 | Pakistan | 86,000 | 7.6 |
| 12/26/2004 | Sumatra | 227,898 | 9.1 |
| 12/26/2003 | Southeastern Iran | 31,000 | 6.6 |
| 1/26/2001 | Gujarat, India | 20,085 | 7.6 |
Finally, I want to pimp a book that’s probably the best read I’ve had in the last 5 years. It’s a detailed account by the Seattle Times science reporter on how northwest geologists figured out our earthquake risks here. Here it is:
http://smile.amazon.com/Full-Rip-9-0-Earthquake-Pacific-Northwest/dp/1570619425
Anyone know if Green Lake is potable with a decent water filter?
Doug, I fully intend to use Green Lake water if we run out. Other than the cyanobacteria problem that occurs regularly in hot weather (usually toward the end of summer, but I expect an early season this year because of the warm winter), I think that a filter will be fine, and you can add a little bleach or iodine to be sure. Our dog drinks from the lake almost every day (except in green slime season when it is very dangerous) and is fine. Wallyhood had a very good piece on the danger of cyano bacteria last year. We are lucky to have Green Lake so close, but in desperation, Lake Union is also an option but less appealing because of old industrial polluters like Gas Works, and the boat traffic. Hard to know for sure, especially if the algae are in bloom.
Since we’re on the topic, here are some great resources for those interested in supporting earthquake relief efforts in Nepal:
Direct Relief International – http://www.directrelief.org/
(consistently rated as a top charity by Charity Navigator; 99% of donations go directly to the programs and services it delivers)
American Red Cross – http://www.redcross.org/
(also goes to support international relief efforts)
Want to direct your donations towards a specific type of relief? You can decide what you want your donation to accomplish and use Charity Navigator to help select an effective charity offering that specific type of aid.
http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=content.view&cpid=1888#.VT-qO61Viko
The Good Shepard Center is a communication hub but it’s a really old and tall brick building. Has it been retrofit?
Leafz- yes, GSC has been retrofit, but I don’t know how well it was done.
Thanks Eric. (Oops, I meant Shepherd not Shepard!)
I think that in the Seattle area, one needs to prepare for lack of food and water for significantly longer periods than one week after a big earthquake. Looking at the gridlock that occurred in the Puget Sound region because of the fish truck rollover accident on 99, it seems that we would be in for a very long wait for food trucks to get in to resupply the stores if just a few major arterials suffered any road closing damage.
While the Seattle fault might produce enormous displacements, I think that the Cascadia fault is so big that its rupture would produce devastation on the coast from Tsunamis as mentioned, and also high intensity rolling earth waves throughout the Puget Sound. Look at the pictures of the 1964 Alaska quake aftermath. I think that people would have seen the ground ripple and tear and heave with the shear wave motion which is expected to be huge. I can’t imagine many water mains and sewers surviving, not to mention some gas lines pulling apart, and some power lines coming down. I have no idea how well the I5 and Aurora bridges will fare, even though they’ve been greatly upgraded. And the elevated sections of I5 (including the I5-I90 intersection) and the West Seattle bridge section are all very vulnerable. All it takes around here is a little hiccup to make travel awful, and simply resupplying food stores (let alone hardware and building suppliers, fuel stations, pharmacies, and other critical supply chains) will not be easy without a special effort by government to prioritize getting those supply lines up, at the expense of normal commuters. I’m not trying to be a downer; I just think that expecting (and preparing for) a month of “outage” is much more realistic than preparing for a week. And the more people are prepared and able to wait it out, the better off everyone will be.
Thanks for the timely reminder about the vulnerabilities we face here in Seattle. Having experienced the Christchurch Earthquake sequence, there are a couple of notes I want to make about preparedness:
1. All natural waterbodies will be contaminated with raw sewage. If a big quake damages the sewer network, the least worst solution is to pump the overflows into the nearest natural water body (so it doesn’t come back up through peoples toilets). IF water has to be trucked in, it will need to be boiled or treated before drinking, so you will be able to use your camping gear then. just remember – you can’t filter whats not coming out of the tap. Have some bottled water in the house.
2. How will you get home? Multi-story parking garages will be off limits pending structural assements, so your car will be stuck for 2-3 months. Unless the city is training transit workers to be emergency responders, buses will probably stop (as it did in CHCH), trains will have to stop, pending line inspections. Christchurch (pop 400,000) is flat, with a regular grid of streets. Complete gridlock set in within 15 minutes. a half hour drive through the least affected parts of the city took 2-3 hours. Travel times into the worst areas
3. Who will get the kids (or grandma)? All three million people in the area are going to be trying to check on thier families and friends. Don’t expect to get a dial tones. Texts will probably go through, but with long delays, and may arrive out of order. Have a plan you can implement without talking to your partner.
4.keep some cash in the house. Even in a really big quake the city will not be uniformly flattened. some buildings will be fine and some will be destroyed. Those shopkeepers who can open, will, but they won’t be able to process plastic.
finally, a ‘zombie apocalypse’ is funny joke, but it’s a poor model for disaster response. Humans are social animals. connecting with others is how we make sense of what we have experienced. Those who have come through in good shape will want to acknowledge thier good fortune by lending a hand, but top-down emergency management organizations are ill-prepared to handle these impulses.
oops – didn’t proofread carefully. the last sentence in point 2 was suposed to read “Travel times into the worst areas were up to 12 times longer than usual.”
I was downtown leaving a parking garage during the 2001 quake and when up on an I5 onramp, thought initially the shaking was due to some huge construction effort. When I saw the man in front of me flopping around like a rag doll in his car, I knew. We both jumped out of our cars at the same time and ran to get off the on ramp which was suspended in air. My cell phone only got busy signals. I started to cry from fear. When it stopped, I drove up to Capital Hill where I knew I could be on land…thousands of people had come out of their offices to stand in the middle of streets. When home finally, I saw that much of my furniture had turned over, pictures had fallen and broken and from the corner of all the large windows in that old two story brick building, had cracks radiating out for all corners. Yet the glass held.
When I did a contract at Starbucks in SoDo a few years later, all anyone could talk about was how awful the quake was to that old Sears building. People had stuff fall on their heads as they made their way out, and everyone who had cars parked in their provided parking (as a contractor my car was on street level 1/8 mile away) had to wait for 4 days to get their cars. Many women left their purses. After that I started wearing mine over my shoulder all the time. Still do!
I took a class downtown around that time and a woman who worked in an older Boeing building in Renton said she actually quit her job. She crawled out of the completely dark building in her hands and knees with ceiling stuff falling on her head. She was totally traumatized.
Great info here. And to think that lots of folks smugly look down their noses at “prepers.” Maybe they have a better idea than some think.
I’d add that keeping supplies outside your house, maybe in a garden shed or garage, would be good. Many houses will get redlined after a quake, and entry will be dangerous. Supplies in the flooded or collapsed basement will do no good.
Also, we will likely go a long time with no need to use these stashed supplies, so remember to rotate the goods occasionally. While “use by” dates are usually veeerrry conservative, some items should be used up and replaced.
Finally, there are lots of places to buy bulk dry foods and supplies. Just be careful, lots of numb skulls are jumping onto this preparedness bandwagon.
Thanks for this great article, and bringing awareness to this.
Every couple of years MEANINGFUL MOVIES in WALLINGFORD hosts an evening on Emergency Preparedness for ours and surrounding communities. This year (on Fri, July 10th) we’ll be showing the film: “CASCADIA: THE HIDDEN FIRE”, an extraordinary presentation on the Cascadia Subduction Zone and many of the other tectonic conditions effecting us here in the Seattle area. And as in past years, we will have a guest speaker to give us the most current information and will bring in the Seattle Emergency Management/ SNAP folks for a short talk on Emergency Prep basics.
In addition, depending on interest, we will host a more detailed hands-on workshop on the next day (Saturday, July 11th) on Emergency Prep specific to the immediate neighborhood. More details to follow at http://meaningfulmovies.org.
Thanks again!!
As many of you read New Yorker article, I have a fresh earthquake concern.
Does anyone know if there is a list/map of buildings of Wallingford that will not do well during a big earthquake? I am specifically interested to learn about Wallingford center because my child will be going. During the daycare tour I asked if the building was retrofitted and the answer was yes but I wonder if there is any official documentation that could prove it.
Thank you
The New Yorker (7/20/15 edition) article “The Really Big One” (subtitled: “The Earthquake That Will Devastate Seattle”, can be found at: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/20/the-really-big-one.
Don’t overlook the opportunity to use the Seattle Night Out (Tues, Aug 4th) to inform your neighbors of the potential risks and the things they can do to mitigate (see: http://www.seattle.gov/emergency-management)