Family Stories - The 1971 Earthquake

Family Stories

The 1971 Earthquake

  Technically this isn't just a story from my past, but it all goes together.

   One Tuesday morning in February of 1971 my alarm clock didn't go off to wake me to get up to attend high school.  Instead I was awakened by a major earthquake.

  It was really my first earthquake.  I remember one minor quake maybe a year or more before.  I knew about them.  My parents were together when a good one hit Tahatchipi(sp) early in their marriage.  And my dad was young, but remembered the big Long Beach quake in the 30's.  So I knew a bit about earthquakes, but it was nothing like the real thing!

   As my world began to move I was aware of odd things.  It was an older apartment building, so it had mercury light switches.  Because of that, the lights in my room were going on and off (until we lost power).  My window curtains were flying parallel to the floor!

  I dove under my blankets.  As our apartment was still rocking and rolling I realized that if the building collapsed I would fall unto the parking garage below.  I had a vision of me landing on the hood of a neighbors car and it made me giggle.

   The worst of the shaking stopped.  It was a 6.9 Richtor scale quake we found out later.  Pretty strong.  Centered in Sylmar.  That was sort of across the LA basin from us, but apparently our apartment was near an active fault, which caused us to feel it so strongly.

   In my terror I hadn't heard my parents in the next room.  Once things started to settle down I heard them ask if I wanted to join them in their room.  I think I was on their bed before they finished the sentence.  We were all fine.  And then a strong aftershock hit.

   As things settled down again my parents decided that we should all get dressed and check things out.  Our electricity was still out, but it would go back on for us within the hour.  Other areas closer to the epicenter weren't so lucky.  We had cracks in our west walls.  Not too serious, but still there.  Some stuff fell of mantels and such.  I think only one ceramic figure broke.  We were lucky.

   My dad took the car to see if our business was ok (it was).  There were no cell phones back then and most phone lines were still out.  Unknown to us, my dad was also checking on his girlfriend and her family.  It worried mom and I that he was gone so long.

   According to my ever present transistor radio, my high school was going to be open.  Time to grab a quick breakfast and head over.  There was some minor damage there.  A glass trophy case had broken and they were cleaning that up as I got there.

   It was one of the strangest days I've ever had at high school.  Too many people were upset for any real learning to happen.  So much fear.  So many stories.  The gang girls from our bario were paler than the pale makeup they usually wore.  Gone was their normal "tough girl"behavior.  It was strange to me that I was less afraid then they were.  There was one good aftershock before lunch.  I remember hearing screams down the hall.

   The aftershocks terrified me.  They went on for months.  One would start and my brain would go into fear overload, expecting another disaster.  After about 6 months of that I started realizing how much the fear was controlling me.  I decided that response was not who I am and began training myself to respond to earthquakes in more functional ways.  It helped that the number and severity of the aftershocks lessened.

   One of the things I've done ever since is collect earthquake stories from quakes I've been in.  There were some classic ones from my apartment complex that day in 1971.  One of my neighbors always left for work at 6 a.m.  Despite the fact that a quake was happening, this man of habit tried to open his door and couldn't.  Due to the direction of the quake, the water from our swimming pool had overflowed and was crashing against his front door!  Another neighbor had just gotten up and was on the toilet.  Not only was his time with nature interrupted, he was constipated for several days after.  I think his body thought the quake would happen again...  The best stories from school that day were from the kids that lived on the east edge of town where the major electric power poles were.  As the power lines were swaying, they started arcing, and the resultant electrical sparks lit up the eastern sky.

   I think how I chose to handle earthquakes morphed into how I handle crisis in general.  I'm the person who is calm and logical (and moving to help) in a crisis.  I always promise myself that I'll give myself time to fall apart later.

   I've developed a fascination with the USGS earthquake reports.  I watch for pattern.  If there's a seismograph anywhere near me I'll find excuses to go watch it.  And, as best as I can, I plan for the possibilities.  I always have canned food in my pantry.  I try to keep water and to keep it rotated, so it's fresh.

   During an actual earthquake (and I've been through some serious quakes since, just not the catastrophic ones) I'm constantly analyzing the quake.  Is all of my family/everyone in the house safe?  How strong is this one?  Do I hear anything falling or breaking?  Dear God, how long is this one going to last?  I'll try to guess the magnitude and direction.

   When I know it's safe, I'll check on everyone and look for damage.  And go on with life.  I know I life in "earthquake county."  I know here in Southern California we are overdue for a major, possibly catastrophic earthquake.  We don't know when or where it will come, so I'm not going to worry about it.  My faire tent is in my garage storage.  That place should survive, even if the apartment building falls down.  I've been a Girl Scout and have camped in some pretty primitive conditions.  I'm pretty sure I could survive (assuming I don't have life threatening injuries) the 3-4 days until the Red Cross starts showing up.

   I don't want to go through a catastrophic earthquake.  But I'm pretty sure I could survive one.  But I'm going to want my time to fall apart afterwards!