Earthquake -- 20 Years Ago Today

On Oct. 17, 1989, I sat down to watch the third game of the Bay Area World Series between the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland Athletics when, suddenly, the TV went off and whole earth shook around me.

It wound up being a 7.1 on the Richter Scale, a big one, that halted the World Series for a time.

It's on my mind now not only for the 20th anniversary, but because the Los Angele Dodges and the California Angels are in this year's playoffs. If they were both to win, the World Series would be held in Southern California, another place prone to earthquakes. I would hope Mother Nature wouldn't decide to hold a repeat performance.

I was also reminded of the earthquake in 2006 on the anniversary of "The Big One" that destroyed San Francisco in 1906. Here's the column I wrote for The Gazette on April 18, 2006 titled "Remembering 'The Big One'":

 In 1989, while living in the south part of the San Francisco Bay area, I settled into my recliner to watch the third game of the Bay Area World Series between the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland Athletics.

At 5:03 p.m. that day, Oct. 17, my TV went blank. A minute later, as I stood to see what was the matter, the ground shook. Pictures fell from the wall, dishes slid from the kitchen cabinets to crash onto the floor. I put my arms over my head and crouched in a doorway.

"Oh, no," I thought. "The Big One!"

Actually, The Big One occurred in 1906 - exactly 100 years ago today - on April 18. While scientists differ on how that quake would have measured on the Richter scale of today, the U.S. Geological Survey estimates the energy released in 1906 would roughly equal 30 of the 1989 quakes.

In addition, consider the differences in the way we live today and what it was like a century ago - most people using horses and buggies; expensive and cumbersome long distance communication by telegrams; no nationwide radio or television networks to let others know what had happened.

George B. Douglas of Cedar Rapids, founder of Douglas Starch, provided The Evening Gazette with a first-hand description for its April 22 edition.

"About 5:15 the next morning (April 18), we were awakened by a violent upheaval of the bed, and upon jumping out I was thrown across the room," he said.

Mr. and Mrs. Douglas, their daughters Margaret and Ellen, a nurse and a maid had arrived in San Francisco the night before the earthquake after spending the winter in Santa Barbara. They checked into a 12th-floor suite at the St. Francis Hotel.

"Mrs. Douglas managed to support herself by the wall and then hurried as best she could to the adjoining rooms to the children," Douglas continued. "I followed, but the violence of the shock after the first few seconds prevented me from making headway. All clung to anything that offered support and waited.

"It was just at dawn, and a sinister yellow light pervaded the atmosphere. The convulsions were accompanied by a roaring as of a mighty wind and the floor heaved and fell. As the moments passed and the shock reached its most extreme stage, it seemed as if the building could not stand, as the great structure rocked and swayed like a ship at sea.

"The iron construction groaned and wrenched and shrieked and every second it seemed as if the building would collapse. But it did not - with one final titanic shake those terrifying moments passed, and, after 28 seconds - which were the longest I have ever known - quiet reigned again."

I know the sound of that quiet - the feeling that nothing is alive after everything around you has shaken your equilibrium - when the earth finally stands still. In 1989, aftershocks continued after the main quake. We had six in the first half-hour, 62 in the first 12 hours, as if each was a new earthquake. Electricity, gas and telephone services were out. I felt alone in the world.

The Douglas family escaped the hotel. Fires burned all around as gas lines broke. The hotel was wrecked. Everyone tried to leave as quickly as possible, many in an `'extreme stage of undress."

In the ensuing calm, many people returned to the hotel for coffee and rolls, only to evacuate again as the first aftershock hit. The Douglases fled to visit friends. By afternoon, as buildings collapsed under explosions and fires grew more intense, they boarded a doctor's private boat to cross San Francisco Bay to Oakland. There, a few hours later, they caught a train home.

I hung around the Bay Area for several months after the 1989 quake, living about 50 miles south of San Francisco. But within a week, the destruction became clear. By the time the numbers were tabulated, this 7.1 quake on the Richter scale killed 62 people throughout central California, injured 3,757 and left more than 12,000 homeless.

Compare that to the 1906 quake, when an estimated 3,000 people died and 300,000 were left homeless.

Back in Cedar Rapids, it was easy to feel safe.

But then I was reminded of the Plum River Fault that shook lamps and created waves in Cedar Rapids swimming pools June 10, 1987. It's just a tiny fracture running from Savanna, Ill., to Sabula, Oxford Junction, south of Olin, north of Mount Vernon and just south of Cedar Rapids. But that 5.0 Richter scale quake was one of a dozen to hit Iowa since 1800 and served as a reminder of the larger New Madrid Fault.

The New Madrid Fault zig-zags from New Madrid, Mo., southwest to near Marked Tree, Ark. It triggered three major earthquakes in 1811 and 1812. The largest, an estimated 7.6 on the Richter scale, was felt in Iowa and as far away as Chicago. Historical accounts say land was lifted as much as 20 feet in the air, and that the bed of the Mississippi River was raised high

enough to reverse water flow.

Some experts predict the longer the New Madrid Fault remains dormant, the greater the chance it will have a 6.3-magnitude or greater earthquake that would damage St. Louis, Memphis and Louisville.

The Midwest could be the site of the next Big One.

To most people, the 1906 San Francisco earthquake was The Big One in the United States. Accounts of the 1906 earthquake can be pretty gruesome - buildings collapsing on people, fire trapping and consuming them, water and food rationed and looters being shot. Damage was estimated at $500 million in 1906, which would be several billion dollars today.

In an interview with The Gazette in 1989, Wencie Dattolo of Cedar Rapids recalled being left homeless by the quake. Wencie was about 12 when the quake struck. She recalled the dirt and brick streets, the throngs of people moving to tent cities, where they would live for weeks, and soldiers preventing her family's return to their home.

While Wencie's father wished to remain in the city where he'd run a fish market, her mother decided to return to Cedar Rapids to be with her family.

Wencie was 95 during that interview. She died in 1998 at the age of 103. But memories of that quake, and the knowledge that The Big One can happen virtually anywhere at any time, live on.