Not So Solid Ground: Earthquakes shake up things

In case you haven’t noticed, the continents are slowly moving and grinding against each other. As a result, we’re experiencing earthquakes extending all the way from Japan to the west coast of North and South America.

This year has been particularly active. There have been a couple of four point quakes in Southern California. Columbia has just been hit with an extremely strong quake some sixty miles beneath its surface. We’re still rescuing the living and uncovering the dead from that event. Then there’s Venezuela which has suffered one of the strongest quakes in its history.

The United States is in the position of providing rescue workers to both its recent enemy, Venezuela, and its longtime friend, Columbia. Even new structures have collapsed in Columbia. The brand new bell tower has fallen into that country’s largest church. Skyscrapers have collapsed burying people under a multitude of floors.

Meanwhile, in Washington state, our country’s most dangerous volcano has been struck by hundreds of earthquakes even though it shows no signs of eruption. It does not need to erupt, however, to be extremely dangerous.

Mount Rainier has steamed for thousands of years and has converted the rock near its peak to something akin to clay. It is also covered by tons of ice and snow. It has a record in the past of converting that assortment of toppings into gigantic mud slides containing rocks and trees that have fallen into the valley and done a horrendous amount of damage.

Some 2 million people live near Mount Rainier and would be killed by another collapse. Because of that, the government has flown over the peak to check for signs of shifting. It has not yet found any, but the danger still exists. Signs in the valley point out escape routes in the event the mud slides. Such a slide would likely reach a speed of 25 miles per hour.

The cascade of earthquakes has never happened on the mountain in this number and is certainly capable of triggering an event.

Hundreds of years ago when North America was still being explored, map makers sailed along the west coast and mistakenly thought that California was an island. Some of the maps drawn back then were highly inventive.

Since then a number of fictional movies have taken that island question seriously and explored the possibility that seismic activity might slice off a section of Southern California.

While there’s no evidence to support that scenario, we do need to be extremely careful about building up that area. We also need to apply every tool possible to insure that buildings constructed in that area can survive serious earthquake activity.

We’ve seen strong quakes along the western fault. We know that those quakes are a preparation for further activity. We need, therefore, to prepare for a worst-case scenario.

Step one would probably be to remove brush from California forests since earthquakes inevitably produce fires by damaging power lines.

Step two would be to insure that even older buildings are structurally sound and able to float on their foundations when the earth moves.

Step three would be to secure bridges and tunnels. Step four would be to make sure we have an adequate and certain water supply. We’ve seen that the California leadership has not recently demonstrated it can supply even a minimal supply of water to fight field and house fires.

We must also be aware that Yellowstone National Park can support Old Faithful because the park is one enormous caldera. Future earthquakes might well have side effects which require closing that park.