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SCCA Magazine |
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ARkStorm:
Scenario for disaster
and opportunity |
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By William E. Davis, Executive Vice President, SCCA
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), with the help of 120 scientists
and other experts, recently released a truly scary “scenario”
for another disaster in California, a 500 to 1000-year
flood prediction based on the six different times this type of event has
occurred here in the last 1,800 years.
Disasters affect the construction industry like anyone else, but unlike
almost any other group, we have an opportunity to be part of the
reconstruction and a responsibility to be ready to serve. Following
earthquakes, fires, landslides – and now floods – the construction industry
is one of the first responders, doing all it can to get things back
to normal. This USGS report outlines a mega-disaster for California,
which will tax our industry’s capabilities to the limit.
According to the USGS Multi Hazards Demonstration Project
(MHDP), which brought us the “ShakeOut Earthquake Scenario” in
2008, the probability of this storm event occurring is roughly the same
as the likelihood of a severe southern California earthquake. The last
time anything approached this level of winter storm activity was in
1861-62, when it rained in the Central Valley for 45 days.
Even as the magnitude of this storm prediction calls to mind Noah
and his ark, the MHDP people have cleverly created ARk as an acronym
for Atmospheric River (the primary way moisture is carried outside the
tropics) 1,000 (the top of the scale proposed for use by atmospheric scientists)
to create the title of the report – ARkStorm Scenario.
This is just the kind of play on words one would expect from Dr.
Lucile M. Jones, an MIT PhD in geophysics and the lead scientist for
both scenarios. She is the expert all southern California media turn to
when earthquakes occur.
Jones created MHDP to use “hazards science to improve resiliency
of communities to natural disasters, including earthquakes, tsunamis,
wildfires, landslides, floods and coastal erosion.” According to the
201-page report, “The project engages emergency planners, businesses,
universities, government agencies, and others in preparing for
major natural disasters. The project also helps to set research goals
and provides decision-making information for loss reduction.”
The storm
Even with its overlay of scientific linguistics, the report reads like a
best seller.
Here’s the basic premise: A massive storm in the Pacific Ocean sends
a river of moisture to crash into the California coast range above Santa
Barbara and below Monterrey. The storm vaults over the low mountains
and plunges into the Central Valley, before climbing the Sierras
and heading east.
The storm flow then continues for more than a month. In many
cases, flooding overwhelms the state’s flood-protection system, which
is designed to resist 100 to 200-year runoffs. The west side of the Central
Valley fills, forming a new inland ocean, replacing the one that
dried up, 300 miles long and more than 20 miles wide. Sacramento
and Stockton go under the water pouring out of the Sierras.
Another finger of the storm bangs into the San Gabriel Mountains
with run-off flooding broad swaths of central Orange County and
eastern Los Angeles County. San Diego, the San Francisco Bay area, and other coastal communities see their low lying
areas fall below the waves beating on
their shores.
Winds in the High Sierras reach 175 mph
and in other inhabited parts of the state, hurricane-
force winds of as much as 125 mph bear
down on power lines, cell towers and anything
that’s not nailed down. Across most of the rest
of the state, winds reach 60 miles per hour.
When it all ends, it takes a month or more
to restore power, water, communications, and
longer to rebuild roads and other infrastructure,
homes, and businesses.
The damage
Here’s how the report sums up the damage: “Hundreds
of landslides damage roads, highways,
and homes. Property damage exceeds $300
billion, most from flooding. Demand surge
(an increase in labor rates and other repair
costs after major natural disasters) could increase
property losses by 20 percent. Agricultural
losses and other costs to repair lifelines,
dewater (drain) flooded islands, and repair
damage from landslides, brings the total direct
property loss to nearly $400 billion, of
which $20 billion to $30 billion would be recoverable
through public and commercial insurance.
Power, water, sewer, and other
lifelines experience damage that takes weeks
or months to restore.”
Flooding evacuation could involve as
many as 1.5 million residents in the inland region
and delta counties. Business interruption
costs could reach $325 billion, in addition to
the $400 billion in property repair costs,
meaning that an ARkStorm could cost on the
order of $725 billion – nearly three times the
loss deemed to be realistic by the ShakeOut
authors for a severe southern California earthquake,
an event with roughly the same annual
occurrence probability.”
Read it at http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2010/1312/.
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