Report Prompts Action to Lessen Quake Effect

Orange County supervisors received a chilling report Tuesday on the death and devastation that a major earthquake in Southern California could wreak and authorized measures to lessen the effects of such a disaster.

The 54-page report by a county Emergency Management Council said federal officials estimated that an earthquake registering a magnitude of 8 or greater on the Richter scale occurring along the San Andreas Fault could kill more than 3,000 people in Orange County and injure nearly 100,000, nearly 9,000 of them seriously.

After more than a year of study, the council, which is made up of the heads of seven county departments, produced 39 recommendations for long-term implementation to cope with an earthquake of the size that struck Mexico City last September.

The suggestions were broken into no-cost items, such as instructing county employees what to do during an emergency and discussing mutual aid plans with private businesses and military installations, and items whose cost still must be estimated, such as providing sufficient emergency equipment in county buildings and undertaking public education programs.

Later phases of what is officially called the Orange County/Southern California Earthquake Planning Process will include steps to be taken if an earthquake were predicted to occur within a month or so, planning for response at the actual time of a quake and rebuilding after the disaster.

“There is a lot to be lost if we don’t enact and implement these recommendations,” said Paul Hess, head of the emergency management division of the county Fire Department.

In the event of a quake of 8 or greater on the Richter scale, the report said, “the 55 Freeway overpass at Lincoln Boulevard has the potential to collapse, obstructing the 55 Freeway, as well as Lincoln Boulevard.”

The Pacific Coast Highway could be closed, the report said. “The 405 Freeway could be closed or disrupted due to multiple problems.”

In addition, five major power plants in the Long Beach-Huntington Beach area would probably be damaged, as would drainage channels from the Santa Ana River, the report stated. Radio systems could be crippled. Fire stations could be damaged.

Phones, Water Supply at Risk

Telephones, water supplies and railroads could be knocked out. Petroleum pipelines could break. Waste water treatment plants could be damaged, increasing the health risks.

The report said that damage would be less severe, but still major, if a quake struck along the Newport-Inglewood fault. It estimated that deaths could be as high as 2,265, with nearly 70,000 people injured, 9,000 of them seriously.

“The key to survival of a major disaster, earthquake, flood or fire is to be prepared beforehand,” county Fire Chief Larry Holms said at a press conference.

He said that “probably the most difficult problem we face” is getting the public concerned enough to prepare for an earthquake that geologists have predicted has a 50-50 chance of occurring in the next 15 years in Southern California.

“A real hard effort has not been made to take care of the public education. . . . The focus has been on governmental response,” Holms said.

Supervisor Roger R. Stanton said that although the exact costs of implementing the recommendations of the report are not yet known, “I think the costs are going to be very modest, certainly in comparison to what you’ll save” if no preparations were made.

Stanton said the report was “a major step” in increasing the county’s earthquake preparedness and promised “immediate implementation of as many of the recommendations as is logically and fiscally possible.”