8 ms·

The Oregon Resilience Plan (2013) [pdf]

42 points by wallflower 3y ago

noodlesUK 3y ago
This whole document is a harrowing read. I’m curious what progress has been made in the decade since it was published.
- nosmokewhereiam 3y ago
  A retired firefighter said every Portland, OR bridge would cut off each part of the city. This report doesn't cover this explicitly, but it's pretty clear that is a major complications to overcome anecdotally.
  - ianburrell 3y ago
    There are new bridges that should stay up and offer way across the river after quake. Lots of smaller bridges are going to come down. I don’t know why there isn’t more focus on them. They should be easier to retrofit. And at least have one in each area that will stay up to keep city connected. For example, I live near hospital but it is on other side of freeway and have no idea if will be reachable.
    - tadfisher 3y ago
      Fremont bridge was the first earthquake-rated design put in. The Marquam has seen seismic upgrades, the Tilikum is brand new and should be fine, as is the new Sellwood Bridge replacement. Every other bridge has been touched since the 80s/90s, but I don't have a lot of faith that, say, the Steel or Hawthorne will stay up.
      - ianburrell 3y ago
        The Fremont bridge should stay up. But the approaches will collapse making it unusable. The Tilikum and Sellwood bridge are the only new ones designed to survive. They have started working on replacing the Burnside bridge. The lift and draw bridges would be destroyed.
    - brewdad 3y ago
      Everyone focuses on the big bridges, which won’t do well in Portland, but no one thinks about the small bridges across creek crossings in neighborhoods and surface streets. I have to cross 3 creeks before I even get to the highway. I’ll be walking/wading out.
  - sonofhans 3y ago
    I live in PDX. There are about a dozen bridges. If even one were left standing over the Willamette it wouldn’t be too bad — at least families could reunite. There are a lot of boats on the river too, and it’s not wide or strong, so people could get ferried across. Regular commute and business traffic would disappear, of course. None of those things are true for the Columbia River separating Oregon and Washington. There aren’t many bridges and they’re very long. The river is non-trivial to cross. That would be a big mess.
    - finnh 3y ago
      oooof I'm imagining having to drive east on 90 to cross the Columbia at Vantage just to drive from Seattle to Portland... (many bridges would have to go down for this to be the only way, of course)
      - cossatot 3y ago
        Earthquake-induced landsliding is common enough that neither 90 or 14 may be open after an M 9 event, especially during the rainy season.
    - jasonwatkinspdx 3y ago
      Yeah, we'd need to borrow ferries from somewhere. But if it's the big one, Puget sound is also probably a mess so there goes the obvious option.
      - lotsofpulp 3y ago
        What would happen to the sound in the event of an earthquake? I figure equipment to unload boats might be damaged, but the boats themselves should be able to come and go as before, no?
        jasonwatkinspdx 3y ago
        The cascadia subduction zone extends from north of Vancouver island to NorCal. The sound is expected to see 8+ on the Richter scale. So they'll probably have too many of their own problems to lend help to Portland.
- whartung 3y ago
  It is harrowing. And I'd like to hope that folks that live in Oregon are familiar with it. Living in California, we get public service announcements and outreach about preparedness. The FEMA guidelines of 3 days supplies are a fine rule of thumb for a lot of disruptive scenarios. I personally feel a 2 week ability to "shelter in place" is about the best one can hope for. But all of those rely on the underlying detail that should some great disaster hit an area like Southern California, that there is a large amount of infrastructure and support outside of the area that can be marshaled and rallied to support those impacted by the event. Simply put, within 2 weeks, not only has the cavalry arrived, you're likely already on your way out to a safe area. Mind, I live in a earthquake zone. My singular true risk is uncontrolled fire. Modern, wood stick frame housing is very resilient and resistant in collapse in case of a large quake. It can condemn the house, but the house will not likely crush the occupants. But fire, well fire is fire. We, unfortunately, know far too much about the disaster potential for fire. So, my hope is that at worse the house gets broken, doesn't catch on fire, and someone will show up within 2 weeks helping me get to someplace else. Other than that, just gotta wing it. 2 weeks of random soup and beans from a can is not a hard thing to stock up. Water is a trick if you're not doing it consciously, but it's not up to the rafters with supplies if you do. Oregon, however, is just not so lucky. If they get their planned for monster earthquake, it's very likely help will not be able to arrive within 2 weeks. You're likely looking at a much more apocalyptic scenario rated at several months. If anything, you should prepare to start hiking out. The infrastructure impact seems to be very high in Oregon. Even nearby help may not be able to get to you, with the roads being in utter ruin. So all I can hope is that there is effective outreach to the folks in Oregon and some solid advice shared on how to potentially cope with these events should they happen. Because Oregon has different issues and the generic guidelines likely will not be successful in this case.
  - brewdad 3y ago
    I agree. My plan is get as far east as I can in the days following the “Big One”There will be bridges out and help will not be coming from the west or north. Likely not the south either. Realistically, I’m already pushing 50, so if the quake happens, I might hope to be crushed in the rubble instantly rather than starve over the ensuing weeks. The longer it takes for the quake to happen, the higher the probability I will.
Stratoscope 3y ago
Related: The Really Big One https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9878160 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9878160 https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/20/the-really-big-one https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/20/the-really-big... https://archive.is/S0GcL https://archive.is/S0GcL
- CatWChainsaw 3y ago
  Assuming everything west of I5 will be toast is a pretty bleak conclusion, I wonder how many people have moved east of that line due to this prognosis.
almost_usual 3y ago
Months to years to restore infrastructure, Oregon will look very different afterwards.

42 points by wallflower 3y ago

noodlesUK 3y ago

This whole document is a harrowing read. I’m curious what progress has been made in the decade since it was published.

nosmokewhereiam 3y ago
A retired firefighter said every Portland, OR bridge would cut off each part of the city. This report doesn't cover this explicitly, but it's pretty clear that is a major complications to overcome anecdotally.
- ianburrell 3y ago
  There are new bridges that should stay up and offer way across the river after quake. Lots of smaller bridges are going to come down. I don’t know why there isn’t more focus on them. They should be easier to retrofit. And at least have one in each area that will stay up to keep city connected. For example, I live near hospital but it is on other side of freeway and have no idea if will be reachable.
  - tadfisher 3y ago
    Fremont bridge was the first earthquake-rated design put in. The Marquam has seen seismic upgrades, the Tilikum is brand new and should be fine, as is the new Sellwood Bridge replacement. Every other bridge has been touched since the 80s/90s, but I don't have a lot of faith that, say, the Steel or Hawthorne will stay up.
    - ianburrell 3y ago
      The Fremont bridge should stay up. But the approaches will collapse making it unusable. The Tilikum and Sellwood bridge are the only new ones designed to survive. They have started working on replacing the Burnside bridge. The lift and draw bridges would be destroyed.
  - brewdad 3y ago
    Everyone focuses on the big bridges, which won’t do well in Portland, but no one thinks about the small bridges across creek crossings in neighborhoods and surface streets. I have to cross 3 creeks before I even get to the highway. I’ll be walking/wading out.
- sonofhans 3y ago
  I live in PDX. There are about a dozen bridges. If even one were left standing over the Willamette it wouldn’t be too bad — at least families could reunite. There are a lot of boats on the river too, and it’s not wide or strong, so people could get ferried across. Regular commute and business traffic would disappear, of course. None of those things are true for the Columbia River separating Oregon and Washington. There aren’t many bridges and they’re very long. The river is non-trivial to cross. That would be a big mess.
  - finnh 3y ago
    oooof I'm imagining having to drive east on 90 to cross the Columbia at Vantage just to drive from Seattle to Portland... (many bridges would have to go down for this to be the only way, of course)
    - cossatot 3y ago
      Earthquake-induced landsliding is common enough that neither 90 or 14 may be open after an M 9 event, especially during the rainy season.
  - jasonwatkinspdx 3y ago
    Yeah, we'd need to borrow ferries from somewhere. But if it's the big one, Puget sound is also probably a mess so there goes the obvious option.
    - lotsofpulp 3y ago
      What would happen to the sound in the event of an earthquake? I figure equipment to unload boats might be damaged, but the boats themselves should be able to come and go as before, no?
      - jasonwatkinspdx 3y ago
        The cascadia subduction zone extends from north of Vancouver island to NorCal. The sound is expected to see 8+ on the Richter scale. So they'll probably have too many of their own problems to lend help to Portland.
whartung 3y ago
It is harrowing. And I'd like to hope that folks that live in Oregon are familiar with it. Living in California, we get public service announcements and outreach about preparedness. The FEMA guidelines of 3 days supplies are a fine rule of thumb for a lot of disruptive scenarios. I personally feel a 2 week ability to "shelter in place" is about the best one can hope for. But all of those rely on the underlying detail that should some great disaster hit an area like Southern California, that there is a large amount of infrastructure and support outside of the area that can be marshaled and rallied to support those impacted by the event. Simply put, within 2 weeks, not only has the cavalry arrived, you're likely already on your way out to a safe area. Mind, I live in a earthquake zone. My singular true risk is uncontrolled fire. Modern, wood stick frame housing is very resilient and resistant in collapse in case of a large quake. It can condemn the house, but the house will not likely crush the occupants. But fire, well fire is fire. We, unfortunately, know far too much about the disaster potential for fire. So, my hope is that at worse the house gets broken, doesn't catch on fire, and someone will show up within 2 weeks helping me get to someplace else. Other than that, just gotta wing it. 2 weeks of random soup and beans from a can is not a hard thing to stock up. Water is a trick if you're not doing it consciously, but it's not up to the rafters with supplies if you do. Oregon, however, is just not so lucky. If they get their planned for monster earthquake, it's very likely help will not be able to arrive within 2 weeks. You're likely looking at a much more apocalyptic scenario rated at several months. If anything, you should prepare to start hiking out. The infrastructure impact seems to be very high in Oregon. Even nearby help may not be able to get to you, with the roads being in utter ruin. So all I can hope is that there is effective outreach to the folks in Oregon and some solid advice shared on how to potentially cope with these events should they happen. Because Oregon has different issues and the generic guidelines likely will not be successful in this case.
- brewdad 3y ago
  I agree. My plan is get as far east as I can in the days following the “Big One”There will be bridges out and help will not be coming from the west or north. Likely not the south either. Realistically, I’m already pushing 50, so if the quake happens, I might hope to be crushed in the rubble instantly rather than starve over the ensuing weeks. The longer it takes for the quake to happen, the higher the probability I will.

Stratoscope 3y ago

Related: The Really Big One https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9878160 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9878160 https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/20/the-really-big-one https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/20/the-really-big... https://archive.is/S0GcL https://archive.is/S0GcL

CatWChainsaw 3y ago
Assuming everything west of I5 will be toast is a pretty bleak conclusion, I wonder how many people have moved east of that line due to this prognosis.

almost_usual 3y ago

Months to years to restore infrastructure, Oregon will look very different afterwards.