“Southern California has about 10,000 earthquakes each year, though most are so small that they are never felt,” says Aram Sahakian, General Manager of the City of Los Angeles Emergency Management Department. Many of the buildings have been retrofitted to withstand severe shaking, but one can still face many hazards and dangers. The many fault systems running throughout the Los Angeles area can lead to earthquakes of all types and sizes. Geological Survey (USGS) is the leading agency that provides the public and policymakers with a clear understanding of natural hazards and provides comprehensive real-time earthquake monitoring. The Federal Emergency Management Agency places California in the “very high risk” category for earthquakes. These Department Emergency Plans must meet National Incident Management System (NIMS) criteria as well as standards outlined by the City’s Emergency Management Department (EMD). In addition, each City department is required to develop and maintain a Department Emergency Plan that outlines and dictates department-specific roles and responsibilities to a variety of hazards in an “all hazards” approach. By maintaining a Local Hazard Mitigation Plan that outlines earthquake hazards, we have identified specific projects to mitigate or lessen the effects of the impact an earthquake can make. Here we are, twenty-six years later and the City continues to hold lessons learned from the Northridge Earthquake in high esteem. Through coordinated response efforts, the City of Los Angeles quickly began to establish shelters, provide clean water, assist with traffic jams, restore power, normalcy and life. The quake killed more than 60, injured more than 9,000, and caused damage amounting to over $20 billion. Portions of the Santa Monica freeway were damaged, cars were discovered among rubble from the collapse of Interstate-5, a total of 466 fires occurred that Monday (some from the eruption of natural gas mains and valves), and structural damage ranging from apartment buildings to historic structures like the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum were beyond apparent. Once the ground ceases the tumultuous process of uplifting, twisting and eroding, you are left to make sense of the damage.īy the time the sun began to rise, the impact of the Northridge Earthquake was incalculable. The nature of earthquakes is that they strike when least expected and during that brief ripple in time, life is at a standstill.
A magnitude 6.7 quake caused by the sudden rupture of a previously undocumented blind thrust fault woke thousands of Angelenos, driving the City of Angels into a nightmarish frenzy. As Californians were nestled in bed during the early hours of the morning, the Northridge Earthquake erupted throughout the west San Fernando Valley at 4:31 a.m.
0 kommentar(er)
