"You take a 7.1 and put it into the Hollywood fault or Newport-Inglewood fault in Long Beach - we're going to see substantially different levels of damage," said Ken O'Dell, president of the Structural Engineers Association of Southern California. It lacks the kind of structures that experts say are most vulnerable in a big quake - unreinforced masonry, brittle concrete, so-called "soft story" apartments and single-family homes not bolted to their foundations.Īs a result, Ridgecrest suffered far less damage than cities hit by less powerful quakes in recent years, including Napa and Paso Robles, where older buildings in the downtown areas crumbled amid the shaking.Įxperts were quick to point out that last week's quakes would have proved far more devastating had they been located near bigger cities filled with more susceptible buildings. Many homes are one or two stories, built in the 1980s. The Mojave Desert town remained largely unscathed because its building stock was relatively new and remarkably resilient. "Ridgecrest, I'm just amazed," California Earthquake Authority structural engineer Janiele Maffei said of the light damage.īut the outcome in Ridgecrest shouldn't provide solace to California's biggest cities.
But overall, most buildings did fine - and many businesses were up and running within a day or two of the biggest shock, a magnitude 7.1. Yes, mobile homes were torn off foundations, chimneys fell, gas lines leaked and some homes caught fire. LOS ANGELES - After major temblors on July 4 and 5, structural engineers descended on Ridgecrest expecting to study destruction from the largest earthquake to hit Southern California in nearly 20 years.
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