The Big One and Building Codes

[3005 332]

As any Southern Californians know, two earthquakes struck the area last night around 11 PM, and then again at 9 AM this morning. It got me thinking about the big quake that LA is due for; it's constantly been reviewed in the classroom, on the news, etc. Now, obviously, a large earthquake will hit Los Angeles sometime in the future, but how close are we to that disaster, and more importantly, will LA survive?

 

Now, if you take a look back at the large quake that hit Japan with a whopping magnitude of 9.0 (one of the five most powerful earthquakes on record), not one skyscraper collapsed. After the Kobe disaster of 1995, Japanese building codes were reformed and new methods were developed. My question is this: will this Big One be a repeat of Kobe? Will our buildings crumble like a house of cards, killing thousands of people?

[Shiki 5,855]

I cannot add too much to this topic, because I live on the other side of the U.S., and I also am not even originally form this country, but looking at some of the tectonic plate maps that are out there, I wouldn't say anything as serious would happen.

 

This is an image showing how the plates move and cause earthquakes near Japan.

 

This is an image showing how the plates on the West Coast of the States move.

 

 

Now, I am not, in any way, educated on earthquakes on a degree higher than most, but just kind of thinking about friction, and other basic laws of physics (also, not extremely educated), it would seem that L.A. wouldn't face as direct of an impact from a large earthquake. If you rub your two hands together, vertically, in opposite directions, while pushing them together at the same time, this is essentially how the plates move near L.A. If you were to push your two index fingers together, against each other, until one was to slip on top of the other, this is how the plates near Japan move. If you do both of these little experiments, you can see that the index finger one has more of an exaggerated reaction. Now, if you were to have a water droplet on one of the sides of your hands and a water droplet on the top of one of your fingers, and done the experiment again, you can really just imagine that the finger experiment would lead to an easier splash/loss of water than the hand experiment.

 

Again, I pretty much base this only on my (under) mediocre understanding of physics and earthquakes. I'm not sure of any details, and all that up there, is pretty much phooey that I made up, so do not let that affect your thinking too much.

 

The only thing I can legitimately say about this topic is; I really hope nothing too bad happens. It would be horrible to see more people needlessly die.

[Ashbad 969]

I'd say it will, the building codes there are suited towards that; of course it'll still involve much destruction, but it will survive I'm sure.

 

Seattle on the other hand...

 

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/04/09/seattle-earthquake-fault.html