DISASTER TO CITY

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIII, Issue 78, 14 March 1933, Page 6

DISASTER TO CITY

FIRE OF SAN FRANCISCO EARTHQUAKE-RIDDEN COAST FORMER TRAGEDIES RECALLED. The destructive earthquake in California serves as a reminder that this otherwise favoured part of North America is peculiarly liable to such visitations. California is situated in the earthquake zone which almost surrounds the Pacific. This belt, which is also remarkable for past and present volcanic activity, runs the whole length of the west coasts of North and South America and thence by the southern coast of Alaska through Kamchatka, Japan, Formosa, the Philippines, the Malay Archipelago, and the New Hebrides to New Zeland. Most of the coastline included in this belt is backed by high mountain ranges and faces particularly deep areas of ocean. California is bounded on the east by a great range of mountains, the Sierra NevaUi, winch is separated from the coastal range for the most part by a broad lowland basin. This basin was forced downward when the sierra, which rises to 14,5®t't. at Mount Whitney, was elevated thousands of feet on its eastern side along the line of a great fault, above which to-day the range displays a steep earthquake escarpment running for hundreds of miles. MANY FAULT LINES. The Coast Ra.ige, from 20 to 40 miles in width and vuiying between 2000 ft. and 8000 ft. in height, is cut by numerous fault lines, some of which betray evidence of recent activity. It is probable that movements along these faults cause not only the major earthquakes from which the region has suffered, but the slight termors that are continually being recorded. In 1812 great destruction was wrought by an earthquake that affected all the southern part of California; in 1865 the region about San Francisco was violently disturbed; in 1872 tlie whole sierra and State of Nevada were violeutyy shaken. San Francisco, which had been shaken more or less severely in 1886, 1898, and 1900, was visited in 1906 by one of the greatest disasters ever experienced by an American city. It occurred at 5.15 on the morning of April 18. Buildings everywhere rocked and swayed. Hotels, theatres, warehouses, factories and stores toppled over and caught fire. The City Hall, erected at a cost of 4,000,000 dollars, and containing a public library of 85,000 volumes, was completely wrecked. The Grand Opera House and three other large theatres fell to pieces and their ruins were consumed by flames. The Palace Hotel, an enormous building, constructed to resist earthquakes, survived the earlier shocks only to fall a prey to the fire. The Valencia Hotel collapsed, burying 70 or 80 people beneath its ruins. DISASTROUS EARTHQUAKE.

Fires broke out not only in the centre of the city, but in the residential districts, and in three days swept an area of seven square miles before their spread was checked. This was done mainly by tho free use of dynamite, the water supply having been put out of action by the earthquake. The total loss of life was about 1000 and 200,000 people were rendered homeless. An official estimate showed that 497 city blocks hac been devastated and 28,U00 buildings, valued at 105,000,000 dollars, had been destroyed. The value of their contents was never computed. About 300,000,000 dollars was paid out by insurance companies, many of which tailed in the process. Others repudiated their obligations. It has always been a matter of pride to the New Zealand and South British insur anee companies, both of which were considerably involved in the disaster, that they "met all their claims fully, promptly and at no loss of stability. Over 10,000,000 dollars in voluntary aid was contributed by American, European and Asiatic communities. Immense quantities of food, clothing and other necessaries were rushed into the stricken city, whose inhabitants slept for weeks in the remaining houses and in streets and parks. RAPID REHABILITATION. The work of rehabilitation was begun in a remarkably Qiort time. Through the courage and energy of the people, the city began within a year to take on a normal appearance. The new buildings which replaced the old were designed to resist both earthquake and fire, and were more costly and substantial than those that had been destroyed. Despite predictions that ban Francisco would n ever rise from her ashes, plans for reconstruction were in hand before the ruins had cooled, and the first contract for a large building was signed six days after tlie disaster. In three years almost every scar was gone, and to-day a vastly greater city stands on the site where the old had its being. San Franciscans always refer to the disaster as “the fire,” and seldom mention the earthquake that was its primary cause. This is a recognition that most of the destruction was more the fault of man than of nature. A point of interest is that tho famous Mission Dolores, near the heart of the city, a building erected by the first Spanish settlers in 1776, survived with comparatively little damage. SANTA BARBARA DAMAGED. The earthquake, which did not reach the intensity of the great Assam earthquake of 1897 or that which devastated Tokio and Yokohama in 1923, was <?ue principally to a movement along a remarkable fault, the San Andreas Rift, which is 570 miles in length, extending from north of Saa Francisco to the desert region of Southern California. After the earthquake it was found that displacement had occurred along 270 miles of the fault, a portion lying close to the coastline. There had been a total horizontal shift varying as a rule from Oft. to 15ft., but in one place reaching 21ft. The only really disastrous earthquake that visited California between 1906 and this year occurred on June 29, 1925, at Santa Barbara, a noted pleasure resort on the coast about; 80 miles northwest ot Los Angeles. Fortunately the shock occurred in tho (.laytime ami at a season when the town’s resident population of 20,000 was not supplemented by thounßndu of winter visitors. Fortu-

irately, also, no serious outbreak of fire occurred. 12 people were killed, about 25 were injured, and the damage amounted to some 15,000,000 dollars. A SEISMIC WAVE. The majority of the buildings in the business district were wrecked. The principal service reservoir of the town’s water supply was emptied of its contents anal a number of oil tanks burst, forming a pool of over 100,000 gallons of crude oil and benzine, which constituted a serious danger until it could be pumped dry. Low-lying areas near the sea were flooded by a seismic wave. The old Santa Barbara Mission, founded in 1786, which had been almost destroyed early in the 19th century anal had recently been restored as the Californian headquarters of the Franciscan Order, lost both its towers and suffered other grave damage. It has sinyc been restored again. The Santa Barbara earthquake was remarkable in that it had been predicted by Dr. Bailey Willis, seismologist at the University of California. Dr. Willis not long before, published a statement that pressures wore accumulating in Southern California, and must shortly be “relieved by readjustments.’’ H e mentioned in particular that Gaviote Peak, near Santa Barbara, had been pushed northward 24ft. in the preceding .”>0 years. So con-

vinced was Dr. Willis that, a heavy tremor would soon occur that he went to Santa Barbara on Juno 27. He was tl),cre when the shocks took place and was able to make valuable observations.