THE MOTHER OF ALL EARTHQUAKES

Wrapping my brain around the Hollywood disaster movie presentation of earthquakes I saw as a teenager used to be a pretty easy task.  Accuracy of the presentation of what really could happen in a gigantic quake always paled in comparison to the entertainment or even shock value of the movie experience, and so I’d walk away from such events thinking something like, “We’ll that was something, but things would never get that bad.” 

Now I am not so sure.

As I watched on live television the tsunami in Japan wash across the land like one of the plagues of Egypt, I literally could not process what I was seeing.  Did I really see a huge wall of water, with semi-trucks and houses looking like miniaturized models, envelop acre after acre in seconds?  Did I really see this wave overtake a highway, hit it broadside and sweep it away?  Were those cars and trucks on the highway actually travelling in both directions before the water hit—as though the people on the road had no idea what was coming?  Was that huge mass of water actually on fire in some places?

When I spoke with earthquake engineer Peter Yanev, the smartest person I know regarding earthquakes, about the tsunami devastation and the unbelievable footage that was on television, I asked him if he’d ever heard of a tsunami washing over land and being on fire at the same time.  He told me that such a phenomenon is actually not uncommon in tsunamis throughout history.  Shocking, yes.  Rare, no.

I’ve seen a map of the total area of shaking from last year’s mega-thrust earthquake in Chile.  I add in my mind to it the tsunami damage in Japan.  And when I combine the two, and lay the resulting earthquake over the Pacific Northwest of the United States, I imagine the mother of all earthquakes.  And unlike those 70’s disaster movies, I’ve got the feeling that the horrific results of this quake are going to be all too real.

I imagine Portland, Seattle and Vancouver BC, all of which could fit within the area affected by an earthquake on the Cascadia Subduction Zone, shaking for 4 minutes as did Tokyo.  I imagine the collapse of dozens of school buildings in Oregon, you know those old brick structures.  I imagine the collapse of 10% of the skyscrapers in Seattle.  I imagine the shoreline areas of Vancouver sinking into the ocean.

And then there is the Tsunami.  I see the Oregon Coast communities disappearing like the towns in northern Japan.  Cannon Beach, Astoria, Bandon, Florence, Newport:  all gone.  The Tillamook and Coquille areas remind me a lot of those farmlands in Japan.  I imagine huge, flaming walls of water, carrying cars and trucks picked up from the coastline, rushing inland a few miles and erasing the farm area, and all the people in the area who never made it out. 

Peter tells me that there is a chance that this quake, the one that could happen tomorrow and forever change the lives of millions, could be around a 9.3 magnitude earthquake.  Chile and Japan all at once.

I may not happen tomorrow. 

But it might.