http://insurancenewsnet.com/article.asp?a=top_lh&neID=20070109376.1_75d30014f0f30f6b
LOS ANGELES - A major earthquake along the San Andreas fault could bring Hurricane Katrina-scale devastation and disruption to Southern California, earthquake scientists and government officials warned Tuesday as they kicked off a yearlong campaign to ratchet up emergency planning and encourage residents to prepare for the inevitability of a powerful quake.
Speaking on the 150th anniversary of the largest earthquake in California's recorded history - a magnitude 7.9 temblor on a section of the San Andreas fault near San Bernardino - the scientists said new computer simulations show that a quake of similar magnitude along the fault today would cause shaking stronger and longer than previously predicted.
Such a quake - lasting up to four minutes - would cause an estimated 150 deaths, 5,000 injuries and $150 billion in economic damage, primarily to homes around the region, said Patricia Grossi, an earthquake risk specialist with RMS, a risk management firm.
Thomas Jordan, director of the Southern California Earthquake Center at the University of Southern California, said there is a 30 percent to 70 percent chance of a 7.9-magnitude quake on the southern part of the San Andreas fault over the next 30 years.
"To seismologists like me, (this section of the fault) could be said to be nine months pregnant," he noted.
The southern section of the San Andreas fault begins in Parkfield, in central California, and runs hundreds of miles south, past the Riverside-San Bernardino area, Palm Springs and the Salton Sea to the Mexican border and beyond.
Jordan said that because of Southern California's geology, Los Angeles would take the brunt of a major earthquake centered in Palm Springs, where many scientists believe the San Andreas fault is particularly overdue for a rupture.
San Diego would be relatively safe during such an event, he said.
"It would be probably less affected than most of the other major communities in Southern California ... because it is so far from the San Andreas fault," Jordan explained. "The problem with San Diego is that there are other faults you want to be concerned about."
One is the San Jacinto fault, which runs through the Borrego Springs area. There's some evidence that strain on the southern San Andreas fault may be shifting westward to the San Jacinto fault, said Lucy Jones, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Pasadena.
If that trend is well-developed, it could mean the San Jacinto fault is actually more dangerous than the San Andreas. Geologists will focus on trying to resolve that key question among several others over the coming year in conjunction with the effort to step up government planning and increase public awareness of earthquakes and their consequences, Jones explained.
"The scientists are taking action" because of the potential looming danger of a massive quake, she added. "We're scared."
The public-awareness part of the campaign aims, among other things, to convince residents around the region to prepare for a quake by retrofitting their house foundations, strapping down bulky furniture and appliances, and stocking water, canned food and first-aid supplies.
A highlight of the effort is a 24-foot trailer modified with special hydraulics to duplicate the powerful shaking that a 7.9-magnitude quake would produce. The vehicle, developed and funded by QuakeHold of Escondido, a manufacturer of earthquake safety fasteners, costs upward of $100,000 and is outfitted with furniture typical of a suburban living room.
It will be taken to schools and business where people will be able to sit inside and experience firsthand the effects of a major earthquake, said Dean Reese, president of QuakeHold.
