Is the Hayward fault more dangerous than the San Andreas?

[sonarrat]

Originally Posted by Milliano

I'm totally ignorant about earthquakes. How high is the risk of loss of life for a bad earthquake in a place like the Bay Area? I'm sure it's much lower than a bad earthquake in a less developed part of the world. That would be my big question, along with the risk of injury.

Very small nowadays. Loma Prieta did bring down a part of the Nimitz Freeway (880), and that killed several people, and there was at least one death when the Bay Bridge collapsed. So the moral of the story: take public transit if you want to be safe in an earthquake..

With regards to things like property - I'm an armchair economist but, I'm not sure if there would be so much to worry about. It would seem like the land values in the Bay Area are so high that the actual buildings aren't necessarily worth a huge amount of money compared to the land that they are built on. So if a structure is damaged, it isn't necessarily so bad. In a devils advocate sense, it might even have the potential to redevelop areas in more efficient/better ways (like the Chicago fire did?). Like a free chance to re-design. Like natural forest fires - which tend to benefit ecosystems (?). Or am I way off base here?

There's definitely something to that. If your $900,000 scraper in North Beach breaks its foundation in an earthquake and has to be demolished, you still have an $800,000 parcel of land underneath it. The best properties to own around here are the worthless ones in the best areas.

[Chelito23]

I recommend you research quakes, because you will be less afraid once you understand more. You should also understand that many Californians are very blasé about earthquakes because as several people on this board have pointed out, they have never experienced one. Only minor tremors here and there. Whenever someone has gone through a MAJOR earthquake, you will always here, "This was the first time I was scared during a quake" and "I saw the ground moving in waves", "it sounded like an airplane" etc. Also, as many have stated, a big quake shakes certain areas differently, so many people who THINK they experienced the Loma Prieta quake, and were on good soil (solid rock), didn't experience anywhere near the same amount of shaking as people in the Marina District, liquafication areas and locals adjacent to the epicenter did. It really is somewhat random, but if you move to an area with bedrock as opposed to sand or clay "soil," the shkaing will be less, unless you are adjacent to the fault.

The other arguments are also valid, large and destructive quakes in any one spot are infrequent. People become extremely compalcent because most of the time there are only small tremors that only people at rest feel. This breeds a false sense of security and a lack of awareness for the general population, who "hear" about these minor events, but do not usually feel them. So, every couple of decades or so, there is a moderate quake that shakes people into action for a couple of months...then they hit the snooz button again.

Keep in mind that most people in CA have NOT experienced strong shaking from quakes, so take the nonchalance with a grain of salt. Talk to people who went through Northridge in the San Fernando Valley, or Loma Prieta in Sta. Cruz or the infill areas of the Bay Area, and you will have your fears validated.

From what I undersand, the San Andreas Fault's northern segment (which is what passes by San Fran) is not *expected* to rupture in a large quake anytime soon. The last large quake on this segment was about 100 years ago (not enough time has passed to unlock this segment, believe it or not). The faults east of the San Andreas are *believed* to be close to the end of their recurrence schedule for another event. Nonetheless, the quake in Kobe, Japan was on a fault that was not "supposed" to rupture, there were many more "likely" candidates....as was also the case in other recent quakes in Japan.

The moral of the story is to get informed, and to realize how little we actually know. Fotrunately these damagin events are infrequent, but it is great you want to know more. You can brace load heavy furniture, buy special insurance, have emergency supplies...but you will always be at risk, which is why it isn't a bad idea to have a plan of action for the places you tend to work, shop and visit. Obviously old, masonry buildings would be a place you would not want to live in, for example.

The other good news is that many of the structures in the Bay Area (but not all, and not enough) have been retrofitted or designed to stand up in heavy shaking. Most structures are not located in fault zones (I believe the California zoning requires set back of something like 100 fee)....so trust me, if you want to have high chances of survival in a quake, California is a pretty good bet, up there with Chile and Japan...but as we all know, this doesn't guarantee zero casualties.

Well I am sure my post will be too long to post, so I will end here. Good luck!

[teeroy]

This may sound like a totally irrelevant response but here goes.
With oil prices rising like they are and te Turkish people setting on ready to invade Iraq and with our consumption of crude which will drive prices to 5 plus per gallon, It really doesn't matter where you live relative to an earthquake, statistically you have a far geater problem living economically than a probable earthquake.

I agree if you need to live in California why worry about something you can not possibly control.

Your time would be better spent convincing the government to go to a universal health care and do away with the IRS and go to a national sales tax where everyone would pay regardless of their citizenship status.

[Fleet]

Originally Posted by aswedc

I'm moving to the Bay Area for work and have to decide where to live. My impression has been that the risk for a disasterous earthquake is higher in the East Bay. True?

It is very possible. The last large quake on the Hayward fault was back in 1836 when a quake with an estimated magnitude 7 occurred.