this is just a test. EARTHQUAAAAAKE!!!

Forget boring old fire drills. In California we have something even better: earthquake drills!

I have to say I was perhaps a little too excited to discover that next month my school will be participating in the Big One of earthquake drills--something called The Great Southern California Shakeout, which will simulate a 7.8 magnitude earthquake on the southern end of the San Andreas fault. For those uninitiated in the Richter (or trendier moment magnitude) scale, that is approximately 5,000 times stronger than the Chino Hills earthquake that rattled California this summer, about a month before I moved there.

A pretty cool video of how the hypothetical earthquake would travel is available here. (White and yellow represent the worst shaking.) Watch for the little pocket of lingering trapped vibrations near the "Los Angeles" dot--East LA, you get fucked pretty hard in this scenario.



Here is a fun earthquake fact I learned while investigating this matter: standing in a doorway is not the safest thing to do in an earthquake! Turns out that piece of popular wisdom started about 100 years ago, when many houses in the area were built from unreinforced adobe bricks, and the doorframe was often the only part of the building that did not collapse in an earthquake. In moden-day buildings, which in this part of the country are built to withstand a hefty seismic shake, the doorway is no safer than any other part of the building. These days, you are far more likely to be injured by falling objects or broken window glass than to be in a building collapse, which is why modern earthquake experts recommend getting under a desk or table instead of heading for the nearest doorway. In a pinch, crouching against an interior wall will also do.

Just exactly how this simulation is going to play out remains somewhat of a mystery to me, but I'm quite intrigued by the official USC email that mentioned "simulated damage to university buildings" and "actors in makeup playing 'victims' who will wait for emergency response." Sweet!

Of course, at 10am on November 13, I will be in Nina Foch's class, and for some reason I doubt she will be participating in said drill. I will, however, try to look for some earthquake victims during the break.