Shake, Rattle, Seattle; It's Goin' Down. Literally.

If you're anything like me, you've lived through at least two minor earthquakes, get a bit paranoid when the bus rolls by shaking your house, and KNOW that a big one's comin' down the pipes. You've probably seen the WSDOT viaduct simulation video, get anxiety when driving on or parking under the viaduct, and had nightmares when you moved into your first Seattle structural atom bomb of an apartment - complete with recurring dreams of shopping at Nordstroms to eventually feel the building fall forward, waking up before you hit the ground. Know, Seattleites that your fears are not the least bit irrational. The verdict is in from seismic experts: We're Fucked.



30+ year structural engineering expert Peter Yanev, wrote on Sunday in the opinions section of the New York Times, the doomsday article every Pacific Northwesterner has been dreading. Now, you've been thinking to yourself, "But we know we live in earthquake country, our buildings are definitely engineered to withstand a large earthquake." You would think. But you're wrong. Yanev says,

Construction codes are based on the probability of earthquakes striking a region. That means Seattle’s buildings, for example, are designed for roughly half of the earthquake loads of buildings in San Francisco or Los Angeles, because earthquakes occur roughly half as often in Seattle as in California’s cities. But the result is that Pacific Northwest cities are full of buildings with slender structural frames and fewer and smaller shear walls. In a mega-quake, many of the region’s iconic tall buildings would probably collapse. The loss of life and property from such a disaster would be far worse than the damage and death suffered in Chile.

Note: As of March 1, 2010 the post Chilean earthquake death tolls exceeded 800, with an approximate 2 million people living in the streets after an 8.8 magnitude earthquake. It should also be noted that due to calculations based on earth quake probability, Chile's structural codes are stricter than Seattle's. Read the full article in the New York Times.


As for all those rumors you heard about the Space Needle being the safest place in the city to be during a quake as the city crumbles around it in a cinematic apocalypse type shot, not true. Give us a 9+ magnitude quaker and consider the Needle down for the count. Goodbye tourists. Maybe it can take out a Duck on the way down.

I'm not trying to scare people, I'm just keepin' it real.