I remember the 7.0 earthquake in Northridge, the destruction, and we had excellent building codes

[Nikki Stone1]

I can't imagine what the Haitians are going through with their 7.3 and horrible building codes. I have been looking at some of these photos on line and it's so heartbreaking because so much of it is unnecessary. Instead of using countries and keeping them poor, the Western powers could have used the same money to retrofit older buildings--like hospitals-- and build structures that could withstand earthquakes. This disaster is not just Haiti's--it's ours.

[Drunken Irishman]

1. My city, Salt Lake City, is like 50 years behind California in its building codes.

Most homes, my home, aren't up to the typical California building code.

They did a study and had a quake of similar size as the Northridge one hit Salt Lake, there would have been up to 5,000 deaths.

There were only 62 there.

I don't look forward to the day such a quake hits here.

[Nikki Stone1]

9. Wow. I knew CA was ahead of the curve on this, but I didn't realize that

other states are so far behind. SLC could be another Haiti under the right conditions.

[Drunken Irishman]

13. The city only started really planning for the big one in the 90s.

We just got our state capitol building up to renovations. All the government buildings are slowly getting there. But most homes in the city are nowhere near where they should be and it's because they were all built prior to the 60s.

We have a lot of brick homes here. I live in a brick home. Brick is one of the worst.

Luckily, the threat isn't as major as California. But I believe they said there is a 50% (or growing) that the Big One (7.0 or greater) will hit Salt Lake in the next 50 years (and that was back in the 90s, so...yeah).

[Nikki Stone1]

17. Brick homes--Lordy! BTW, your local RC is collection donations

http://www.abc4.com/content/news/state/story/Utah-Red-Cross-calls-for-Haiti-donations/zf20IYrmZUmAU2zhfVuyXg.cspx?rss=1451

[ddeclue]

42. If you think that's bad, you better hope the New Madrid fault never moves again..

otherwise say goodbye to Chicago, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Grand Rapids, Memphis, Nashville, Louisville, Baton Rouge, Little Rock and New Orleans.

[Nikki Stone1]

51. What are the chances of that?

?

[slackmaster]

2. I know two families that had moved from San Diego to LA, and moved back after that one

The primary breadwinners were software engineers who wrote bank software. The S&L crisis of the late '80s - early '90s put them out of work in San Diego, and they were able to find jobs in Los Angeles.

Both had their homes condemned after the Northridge quake. I believe one family was renting and the other had bought their home. The ones that owned the home called the lender and said basically "We don't have earthquake insurance. We're out of here. Come get your house."

[Nikki Stone1]

18. There were so many red-tagged structures and condemned homes.

Those poor families. :(

[Donnachaidh]

23. we were redtagged and the place was condemned

We moved out of the area 6 weeks after the quake. Six months later, Fema decided the apartment was fine, and they wanted their money back!!!!!?????!!!!

Fought for a year over that BS. Still have nightmares about that morning.

[Nikki Stone1]

24. FEMA did what?

That's insane. What a horrible thing to go through.

[Donnachaidh]

26. yup. Sure did.

And us in Georgia with an infant and the HUGE $2400 check they granted us for *expenses*.

Luckily I was anal enough to keep lists of the people who had helped us all throughout the process, and copies of EVERY piece of paper that was generated, so they backed off. But I'm sure they did the same to others. Probably did the same to Katrina folks.

[Nikki Stone1]

35. They gave your grief for $2400?

That's insane!

[Donnachaidh]

41. turns out the former landlord was calling in ALL his favors to keep from sinking HUGE amounts of

money into retro-fitting it the way it was supposed to be after being red-tagged. He's a pharmacist and lifelong resident of the area, and a cheap son of a bitch too. So somehow he got the redtagging lifted after we left, which caused the call back on the small amount of cash they gave us to re-settle.

Politics. The schmuck would rather do that than make the building as secure as possible.

[Nikki Stone1]

45. The schmuck, as you call him, was a criminal

And people are going to die in places he owns if there's another quake.

[slackmaster]

29. I don't believe it for a second

Bill Clinton was President when that happened.

:sarcasm:

[Nikki Stone1]

34. Oh stop.

:D

[enid602]

3. Haiti

But how would the world have known that Haiti is prone to earthquakes? It´s in an area that does not normally have earthquakes. This earthquake could just as easilly happened in NYC, where you´ve got unreinforced masonry construction, no floating foundations, no space between buildings, etc. Remember, the last New Madrid quake affected NYC.

[Brickbat]

15. Haiti is right on a fault line.

That's generally a good place to find earthquakes.

[Baclava]

21. Stay away from the edges of those plates

They've been cracking for 100's of millions of years.

It's just bad luck when it's your turn.

[Xithras]

19. The entire Carribean is a known earthquake zone.

In fact, Haiti, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, and many of the other ringing islands only exist because they have been upthrust by the tectonic plate boundary that runs along them. That boundary is just as active and powerful as the San Andreas or any other major fault in the world, and has a long history of major quakes.

[Nikki Stone1]

20. What's odd is that even the Presidential Palace was not retrofitted enough to withstand this quake

I know in LA they keep telling us that we are ready for an 8, but I have my doubts.

[malaise]

33. There was a good thread discussing the real strength of this

one because of its depth and what I gathered is that this was as close to a 10 as you'll get because it was so shallow. I'm not sure any buildings were going to survive this one but I'm damn sure that the absence of a building code for the poor means hundreds of thousands who didn't have to die are dead.

[Nikki Stone1]

36. I'd love to see a link to that discussion on depth.

I didn't realize that it was a shallow quake.

[malaise]

47. Here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x7453127

[Nikki Stone1]

53. Thank you.

I appreciate it.

[ddeclue]

43. You have to understand just how poor Haiti is.

[Nikki Stone1]

52. But even poverty stricken nations can have rich leaders with up-to-date palaces

I guess that not the case in Haiti.

[Bicoastal]

4. Was '94 really a 7.0?

I thought it was only 6.6 or 6.7, and remember, there's a world of difference between each tenth of a point on the Richter Scale.

[Drunken Irishman]

5. It was a 6.7.

[Donnachaidh]

7. It was initially reported as 6.8 or 6.9, but was later lowered

We had friends calling from London who had heard it was over a 7. They were frantic about finding us.

[Nikki Stone1]

11. It was originally reported on the LA news as a 7.0.

I guess it was adjusted. But I can tell you the damage was awful and the rebuilding on the CSUN campus took 5 years, and some buildings were red-tagged.

[blm]

10. In my neighborhood it was a 7.8. It was lowered by officials for accountability reasons, iirc.

At the time I heard that anything 7 or above would have triggered a serious flow of DOLLARS to the residents effected.

[Donnachaidh]

6. we lived a block south of CS Northridge and just north of the hospital

We didn't think it was a quake -- we thought it was a bomb.

Those folks in Haiti are going through absolute hell right now, compared to what we did. The freaking palace is GONE.

We have NO excuses not to help - none.

[blm]

12. I was nearby in North Hills....the violence of that quake was indescribable.

And it did look like the entire area was carpetbombed. Imagine if that quake had happened during the day when people were out and about. The deathtoll would have been enormous.

Time of day and building standards are making the difference with this quake. It's horrifying.

[Nikki Stone1]

16. It did look like a bomb hit it.

And that's with modern building codes and everything.

[Nikki Stone1]

14. Exactly. I was living in the Valley at the time, and it was STRONG

And even with our building codes, so many places in the Valley were red-tagged. Whole building, just useless. I can't imagine what's going on in Haiti right now and all of us Angelinos who know first-hand how powerful these things are need to help. I sent my $100.

CARE: Haiti relief fund.
https://my.care.org/site/Donation2?df_id=5080&5080.donation=form1&s_src=171040010000&s_subsrc=redyhaitiearthquake110&utm_source=yahoo&utm_medium=cpc&utm_term=haiti%20relief%20fund&utm_content=34004560521&utm_campaign=6359692521&OVRAW=haiti%20relief%20fund&OVKEY=haiti%20relief%20fund&OVMTC=standard&OVADID=34004560521&OVKWID=275964575521

B'NAI B'RITH INTERNATIONAL PROVIDES DISASTER RELIEF IN HAITI
http://www.wfn.org/2010/01/msg00059.html

INTERNATIONAL RED CROSS

http://www.icrc.org/web/eng/siteeng0.nsf/html/helpicrc

[Captain Hilts]

8. The Tahachepee - I can't spell it - in South Cal was also in that range, wasn't it?

[malaise]

22. The California earthquake was much deeper

Even well-built structures in Haiti were flattened here so we can expect massive casualties from the shacks on the hillside and near the capital port.

[Nikki Stone1]

25. The death toll is just going to be shocking.

This is a really awful day.

[malaise]

28. Last night I warned DUers that we were looking at a minimum 100,000

Now I'm hearing 500,000. :cry: :cry: :cry:

[Nikki Stone1]

30. Oh dear God.

Half a million?

[ShamelessHussy]

27. I survived the Kobe quake in 95

And I am sure I would not be here today if not for their building codes. Especially being on the 9th floor of a 14 story apartment complex on a man made island, none the less ( port island )

my heart goes out to all the people in Haiti.

[Nikki Stone1]

32. I forgot about Kobe.

That was a bad one.

[Javaman]

38. Exactly one year after Northridge. Weird stuff. nt

[nadinbrzezinski]

31. TO be quite honest Cali standards have never

truly impressed me.

Why?

I went through SEVERAL seven pointers in Mexico City while growing up. Oh wait but the 1985 quake... that was an 8.1 that lasted a minute and a half, and it did damage, as spectacular as it was, to less than one percent of the infrastructure. Yes it did kill about 10K people, realize the city had 20 + million.

Now it did a lot of damage to the political system, but that is another story, and it led to the actual professionalization of disaster response... but a seven pointer and the damage it did to Northridge? I shudder what the expected eight pointer will do.

Hell there is an overpass on I-5 that should not have been rebuilt, for geologic reasons, either in 1971 or after it failed again after Northridge.

I know this will be a shock, but with all the problems in Mexico, if i have to go through a seven pointer, I'd rather be at home with parents in Mexico City. Their home and the city have a better chance of coming through than my apartment in San Diego. (There are also geologic reasons for that by the way, and yet another reason I want to sell when my parents are no longer here)

[Nikki Stone1]

37. What geologic reasons are there for your SD apartment being worse than MC?

Just curious.

And Northridge looked like a disaster area.

[Javaman]

39. Actually as bad as Northridge was Santa Monica was a heck of a lot worse.

The ground there is sandstone. It just liquefied under the shaking.

[Nikki Stone1]

46. Were you in Santa Monica?

I used to hang out a lot down there before I worked 3 jobs. :)

[Javaman]

49. back in the day: I used to work down there a lot with several production companies.

I remember seeing two churches that had there huge cupola's slide off to the ground. Several of the "sea side" hotels wrecked, etc. It was a mess.

[Nikki Stone1]

50. Wow. I didn't realize SM had gotten so badly hit.

I was living in the Valley by then and was spending a lot of time in Northridge on a job. That's why Northridge is so vivid in my mind.

[nadinbrzezinski]

40. I'm on a river bank,

so sandy terrain is a concern for liquification.

To be brutally honest it should have never been zoned for apartments.

Oh and the chances that it will take I-8, or parts of it, or a few over passes for the same reason are there as well. That is why Caltrans did a lot of retrofitting... but even they realize an 8 pointer they expect damage if not outright failure.

[Nikki Stone1]

44. Yikes. I didn't think about the sand.

Wasn't that the problem with the Mission District in San Francisco in 89?

[nadinbrzezinski]

48. Yes and Colonia Reforma in Mexico City

as well as a few others, including the Hospital General that collapsed.

This is one of those cases where I wish I never knew what I know.

[flyarm]

54. My home was condemned..we lost everything..watching this has been very difficult for me..

but my husband and I held each other this afternoon and told each other how grateful we are to have gotten through it..and rebuild our lives. It wasn't easy..but we were lucky and we lost no one..

We thank BILL CLINTON..for making the recovery as good as it could be, WITH HIS LEADERSHIP AND HIS GREAT TEAMS OF RESPONDERS...HE IS RESPONSIBLE FOR SO FEW LOST LIVES IN MY HUMBLE OPINION in the Northridge earthquake!

We gave money to Unicef today and My husband just gave a huge contribution to Bill Clinton's Haiti Earthquake Relief.
http://www.clintonfoundation.org/haitiearthquake/

I just know the money will get to the people quick through Bill.

We will be both going to Red Cross to give blood tommorrow..and we now live in Fla and many in Our community are from Haiti..I will be trying to volunteer with them.

I know i had some post traumatic stress, in 1994...it took me almost 2 years to cry..after losing everything..but we survived ..and we were able to move on in our lives..we were lucky...

What these people are going through is horrible..if you can give $5.00..please do so.

The recovery in Haiti will be long and hard and horrible...so many in Haiti had little to begin with..

If i can ask one thing..please give what you can..even a dollar will help..time is of the essence.

Now I am crying again..I am lucky ..I can cry today!

Today my tears are for the wonderful people of Haiti, that are suffering the worst..any human should have to...the loss of their loved ones..and the loss of their homes and hometowns.

fly