Texas doesn't seem quite as bad.

[Mischka]

So, the Pacific Northwest is going to catastrophically collapse thanks to a massive Cascadia earthquake. Not of matter of if, only a matter of when:

We now know that the Pacific Northwest has experienced forty-one subduction-zone earthquakes in the past ten thousand years. If you divide ten thousand by forty-one, you get two hundred and forty-three, which is Cascadia’s recurrence interval: the average amount of time that elapses between earthquakes. That timespan is dangerous both because it is too long—long enough for us to unwittingly build an entire civilization on top of our continent’s worst fault line—and because it is not long enough. Counting from the earthquake of 1700, we are now three hundred and fifteen years into a two-hundred-and-forty-three-year cycle.

And the Cascadia earthquake is just the beginning of this apocalyptic end. Next comes the aftershock, mudslides, and manmade disasters, before it gets really, really, really bad:

Subduction-zone earthquakes operate on the opposite principle: one enormous problem causes many other enormous problems. The shaking from the Cascadia quake will set off landslides throughout the region—up to thirty thousand of them in Seattle alone, the city’s emergency-management office estimates. It will also induce a process called liquefaction, whereby seemingly solid ground starts behaving like a liquid, to the detriment of anything on top of it. Fifteen per cent of Seattle is built on liquefiable land, including seventeen day-care centers and the homes of some thirty-four thousand five hundred people. So is Oregon’s critical energy-infrastructure hub, a six-mile stretch of Portland through which flows ninety per cent of the state’s liquid fuel and which houses everything from electrical substations to natural-gas terminals. Together, the sloshing, sliding, and shaking will trigger fires, flooding, pipe failures, dam breaches, and hazardous-material spills. Any one of these second-order disasters could swamp the original earthquake in terms of cost, damage, or casualties—and one of them definitely will. Four to six minutes after the dogs start barking, the shaking will subside. For another few minutes, the region, upended, will continue to fall apart on its own. Then the wave will arrive, and the real destruction will begin.

Among natural disasters, tsunamis may be the closest to being completely unsurvivable. The only likely way to outlive one is not to be there when it happens: to steer clear of the vulnerable area in the first place, or get yourself to high ground as fast as possible. For the seventy-one thousand people who live in Cascadia’s inundation zone, that will mean evacuating in the narrow window after one disaster ends and before another begins. They will be notified to do so only by the earthquake itself—“a vibrate-alert system,” Kevin Cupples, the city planner for the town of Seaside, Oregon, jokes—and they are urged to leave on foot, since the earthquake will render roads impassable. Depending on location, they will have between ten and thirty minutes to get out. That time line does not allow for finding a flashlight, tending to an earthquake injury, hesitating amid the ruins of a home, searching for loved ones, or being a Good Samaritan. “When that tsunami is coming, you run,” Jay Wilson, the chair of the Oregon Seismic Safety Policy Advisory Commission (OSSPAC), says. “You protect yourself, you don’t turn around, you don’t go back to save anybody. You run for your life.”

The entire (lengthy) article is nail-biting, eye-opening reading. I didn't even quote the really good bits. The conclusion? We are entirely, utterly unprepared for the scope of what we now know will occur.

 

[spacekowboy]

I'll still prefer to deal with earthquakes over tornadoes. Seriously, fuck those things.

 

[Mischka]

The Cascadia earthquake isn't just an earthquake. When it hit in 1700, it transformed the land, destroyed forests, and wiped out an entire people. And today the area is much, much more populated, and directly atop the most vulnerable land. No tornado could ever, ever come close to the devastation.

 

[InWord]

I'll still prefer to deal with earthquakes over tornadoes. Seriously, fuck those things.

I used to live just west of the San Andreas fault. Holy Mother of Jesus ( I typed "Jesus" in espanol btw). We had a 6.8 that literally cracked my home down the center. Fuck earthquakes. I know, I know, tornadoes. But still, fuck earthquakes.

 

[Oh_That_Guy]

I don't mean to belittle your concerns but I don't understand why people worry about these things. The pacific northwest, Yellowstone, San Andreas, etc. IMO it's a waste of energy to worry about such things. They will happen when they happen and nothing we do will change or stop it.

 

[Oh_That_Guy]

I used to live just west of the San Andreas fault. Holy Mother of Jesus ( I typed "Jesus" in espanol btw). We had a 6.8 that literally cracked my home down the center. Fuck earthquakes. I know, I know, tornadoes. But still, fuck earthquakes.

You can run or hide from a tornado. Not so much from an earthquake. Although if I had to choose between which one I want to get caught in, I'll take the earthquake.

 

[Mischka]

We cannot stop it, but I disagree that we cannot prepare. Look at Japan; as devastating as the earthquake and tsunami were in 2011, the destruction would have been greater by a magnitude had the country not prepared. We did not even know about the Cascadia earthquake zone until the last 50 years, so we built up large population centers in the most volatile areas. Our death toll and infrastructure will be massive in comparison; now it is a matter of stemming that devastation and preparing those we can for evacuation.

 

[InWord]

We cannot stop it, but I disagree that we cannot prepare. Look at Japan; as devastating as the earthquake and tsunami were in 2011, the destruction would have been greater by a magnitude had the country not prepared. We did not even know about the Cascadia earthquake zone until the last 50 years, so we built up large population centers in the most volatile areas. Our death toll and infrastructure will be massive in comparison; now it is a matter of stemming that devastation and preparing those we can for evacuation.

I say everyone from that area move to Kentucky. Raise the IQ of that state a point or two.

 

[thør]

So, the Pacific Northwest is going to catastrophically collapse thanks to a massive Cascadia earthquake. Not of matter of if, only a matter of when:



And the Cascadia earthquake is just the beginning of this apocalyptic end. Next comes the aftershock, mudslides, and manmade disasters, before it gets really, really, really bad:



The entire (lengthy) article is nail-biting, eye-opening reading. I didn't even quote the really good bits. The conclusion? We are entirely, utterly unprepared for the scope of what we now know will occur.

And what about the lahar off Mt Rainer? A little shaking will induce that, too.

 

[Oh_That_Guy]

We cannot stop it, but I disagree that we cannot prepare. Look at Japan; as devastating as the earthquake and tsunami were in 2011, the destruction would have been greater by a magnitude had the country not prepared. We did not even know about the Cascadia earthquake zone until the last 50 years, so we built up large population centers in the most volatile areas. Our death toll and infrastructure will be massive in comparison; now it is a matter of stemming that devastation and preparing those we can for evacuation.

I'm sorry but it all seems a bit much for something uncontrollable and essentially unknowable in terms of a time frame. Most people are going to worry about what they know is going to happen. Few worry about what might.
People line up to go to Yellowstone and you got zero chance of survival when that place blows. Unlikely a populace will embrace any large scale preparations for an earthquake that may or may not happen in their lifetime or even in their grandkids lifetime.

 

[Oh_That_Guy]

I say everyone from that area move to Kentucky. Raise the IQ of that state a point or two.

Mmm, I think maybe you give the pacific northwest a little too much credit.

 

[InWord]

Mmm, I think maybe you give the pacific northwest a little too much credit.

We have a poster from Kentucky here. And, I've been to all the west coast. You may be right.

 

[Mischka]

And what about the lahar off Mt Rainer? A little shaking will induce that, too.

That was the word I couldn't remember! Thank you. The lahar will annihilate the coastal population in its path to the ocean.

 

[InWord]

Hate it when I have to google.

 

[spacekowboy]

I've lived through multiple earthquakes of 6.0 or greater in my short time on this rock and I know they are scary. I get the bubble guts when occur. It however does not compare in my mind to the swirling vortexes of death and destruction waiting to suck me up into the clouds and spit me out on the other side of the rainbow.


Yes I know it's irrational.
I'm okay with that.

 

[InWord]

It however does not compare in my mind to the swirling vortexes of death and destruction waiting to suck me up into the clouds and spit me out on the other side of the rainbow.

Damn, my ex-wife gets around!

 

[Oh_That_Guy]

I've lived through multiple earthquakes of 6.0 or greater in my short time on this rock and I know they are scary. I get the bubble guts when occur. It however does not compare in my mind to the swirling vortexes of death and destruction waiting to suck me up into the clouds and spit me out on the other side of the rainbow.


Yes I know it's irrational.
I'm okay with that.

It's because in an earthquake you have a pretty good chance of survival and even survival without injury in most cases. You get in a tornado and you're saying hello to Dorothy in a matter of seconds.

 

[IrezumiKiss]

Thank Buddha that Mischka's erotically-charged avatar is here to induce calm and happiness in the face of catastrophic inevitability.

 

[thør]

I've lived through multiple earthquakes of 6.0 or greater in my short time on this rock and I know they are scary. I get the bubble guts when occur. It however does not compare in my mind to the swirling vortexes of death and destruction waiting to suck me up into the clouds and spit me out on the other side of the rainbow.


Yes I know it's irrational.
I'm okay with that.

Indeed, I've lived through a few large quakes. Even watched shit fall down on people. Those tornadoes scare the hell out of me.

I'll take my chances here in Alaska.

 

[parodyluvr75]

I don't think they can predict earthquakes with any accuracy, though I do remember some crazy guy several years ago who predicted 2, within weeks of dates and a flood that was off by a few months. He had some crazy system he used, I remember he explained on the show he was on and I went wtf? He predicted the second earthquake for four or five months after the show aired. it happened though smaller magnitude than he said, I was like wtf again, crazy bastard was right.

It was probably a coincidence but strange.

If you can find that guy ask him, he's the only one that ever managed it that I recall. Anyone can talk about a fault line and doom say about earthquakes but the earth counts millennia and plays by her own rules.

 

[chillywilly2]

Fuck tornadoes and fuck earthquakes...I'll stick with a nice bit of snow instead

 

[parodyluvr75]

Fuck tornadoes and fuck earthquakes...I'll stick with a nice bit of snow instead

When we fall into a big crater we're taking Canada with us, that's the plan, sorry.

 

[BotanyBoy]

Yea and one day The entire NW quadrant of the continent will get fucking leveled and sanitized by Yellowstone.....it's just a matter of time.


Till then I'll keep the 81F july, snow capped mountains of emerald green forests and the complete lack of Bible thumping whack job conservatives trying to control what I consume, who I fuck and how.

 

[Lancecastor]

The Lit servers hosting Mischka's nipples must be backed up to a secure location forthwith!

 

[Fata Morgana]

The Lit servers hosting Mischka's nipples must be backed up to a secure location forthwith!

They belong in the Hall of Fame in their own right.