Here's Something to Look Forward To

The earthquake scientists at Cal Tech have run some simulations that, should they occur, could make for a wild ride in Orange County where I live:

A magnitude 7.8 earthquake on the southern San Andreas fault could shake Orange County for at least 60 seconds, inflicting hundreds of millions of dollars in damage and causing severe stress on high-rise buildings, says one of the most advanced computer simulations ever done on Southern California seismicity.

The U.S. Geological Survey produced the simulation for the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security, which will use it as the basis for Golden Guardian 2008, a large emergency preparedness training exercise to be held Nov. 13.

“The situation in Orange County wouldn’t be as bad as it would be in San Bernardino, Riverside or even Los Angeles,” says Ken Hudnut, a geophysicist for USGS. “But the damage in Orange County would be significant.”

The USGS and its collaborators haven’t finished estimating how many people could be injured or killed in such a earthquake, or how much damage it would cause. Those figures won’t be ready until April. But some of the early research suggests that the economic loss to buildings alone could exceed $700 million in Orange County. And it would happen fast. The simulation says that seismic energy would reach the county’s eastern border about 40 seconds after the quake begins, and it would shake the region hard for 60 seconds or more.

Just about every earthquake I've ever been through lasted no more than 10 or 15 seconds. One minute is a long, long time if everything around you is doing the fandango and trying to fall down.