Someone sent me a text following our very successful Get Ready Long Beach workshop this past Saturday remarking that "you are good. You have an earthquake preparedness workshop and then there was an earthquake in Southern California. How'd you do it?"
That is true. Following our workshop almost 33 quakes were registered in Southern California by the US Geological Service. But this is not uncommon in Southern California which is why we need to get prepared. It isn't a matter of if but when.
Below is an excerpt from USGS about the Long Beach earthquake which hit on March 10, 1933 at 5:54 pm:
March
10, 1933 at 5:55pm a 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck on the
Newport-Inglewood fault. Shocks similar in magnitude and intensity to this
event have occurred in this area in the past - notably July 28, 1769; December
8, 1812; and July 11, 1855.
This earthquake caused serious damage to weak masonry structures
on land fill from Los Angeles south to Laguna Beach. Property damage was
estimated at $40 million, and 115 people were killed.
Severe property damage occurred at Compton, Long Beach, and
other towns in the area. Most of the spectacular damage was due to land fill,
or deep water-soaked alluvium or sand, and to badly designed buildings. Minor
disturbances of ground water, secondary cracks in the ground, and slight earth
slumps occurred, but surface faulting was not observed. Along the shore between
Long Beach and Newport Beach, the settling or lateral movement of road fills
across marshy land caused much damage to the concrete highway surfaces and to
approaches to highway bridges.
At Compton, almost every building in a three-block radius on
unconsolidated material and land fill was destroyed. At Long Beach, buildings
collapsed, houses were pushed from foundations, walls were knocked down, and
tanks and chimneys fell through roofs. Damage to school buildings, which were
among the structures most commonly and severely damaged by this earthquake, led
to the State Legislature passing the Field Act, which now regulates
building-construction practices in California.
The earthquake was felt almost everywhere in the 10 southern
counties of California and at some points farther to the northwest and north in
the Coast Range, the San Joaquin Valley, the Sierra Nevada, and the Owens
Valley. It also was reported in northern Baja California. A sharp foreshock
occurred near Huntington Beach on March 9, and many aftershocks occurred
through March 16. For several years, minor aftershocks continued to occur, most
often centering near the two ends of the disturbed segment of the
Newport-Inglewood fault.
