Volunteering at San Francisco Earthquake

On Tuesday, October 17, 1989 a 6.9 magnitude earthquake shook San Francisco, Oakland, Los Altos and surrounding areas. The 1989 World Series, between San Francisco Giants and Oakland Athletics was scheduled to begin at the Candlestick Park at 5:35 pm and the pre-game show started at 5:00. When the quake struck at approximately 5:04 pm, sportscaster Tim McCarver was narrating taped highlights of Game 2, which had been played two days prior across the Bay Bridge in Oakland. Television viewers saw the video signal begin to break up, heard McCarver repeat a sentence as the shaking distracted him, and heard McCarver’s colleague Al Michaels exclaim, “I’ll tell you what, we’re having an earth– .” At that moment, the signal from Candlestick Park was lost.

The earthquake shook the Marina district of San Francisco and long stretches of the Nimitz freeway (I-880) had collapsed. The damage was unimaginable, and there was nothing else on the radio and TV but news and images of the aftermath.

Many buildings collapsed and many more suffered great damage. Friday morning Fahima and I could not wait any longer: we have decided to drive up to San Francisco with the intention to report at the city building and safety department and volunteer my help as a licensed engineer. We stopped at my office to grab two hard hats and before 9 am we were on the road.

We made a short stop at my favorite furniture store in the San Fernando Valley to take one more look at the living room sofa and armchair set we have seen before. We liked it and ordered it right away from Italy. It graced our living room in Upland for twenty years until we have moved to Riverside.

We arrived at San Francisco late in the afternoon and stayed at a hotel on Fisherman’s Wharf, close the Marina district. We saw the remains of a four-story apartment house that had burned to the ground: it was frightening and sad to witness the unstoppable power of the fire, and the human tragedy it caused was too much to comprehend. Mattresses, bicycles, children’s toys, a computer keyboard and several burnt out and twisted carcasses of what used to be automobiles were telling the silent stories of the many disrupted lives.

Next morning, we have surveyed the devastating sights the earthquake produced: the collapsed buildings and miles of collapsed freeway. The Nimitz freeway from Oakland to San Francisco was a double decked elevated route, with the northbound lanes centered above the southbound lanes. Due to the earthquake, the vertical columns which supported the upper deck have failed and the upper deck had collapsed onto the lower deck, trapping all vehicles and killing many drivers and passengers of those vehicles.

I did not have to worry about finding city hall: the building and safety department already had an office trailer at the Marina district, complete with detailed maps of every affected city block and all buildings. These large poster size maps were displayed on the walls of the office trailer and city engineers were busy marking them with different colors in function of the degree of damage and method of salvage.

The engineer in charge welcomed my offer to volunteer and explained me how I could be helpful. Their plan was to bulldoze all damaged buildings (and I must mention that in this context, damaged meant irreparable damage, buildings shifted off their foundations, multistory buildings with collapsed first floors, and buildings laying fully or partially on their sides). However, many owners and tenants (most of these buildings were two to four stories high apartment buildings) came to the trailer requesting (read: pleading, begging) to be allowed a so called “soft demolition”, to carefully demolish layer by layer, therefore giving a chance to the people to go inside and salvage at least some of their belongings: documents, furniture, appliances, artworks and small but emotionally meaningful items, photo albums and the like.

My job was to evaluate the actual condition of these damaged buildings and assess the feasibility and risk of soft demolition versus bulldozing. They gave me full authority and power to make decisions and to present my approval or denial on a plain handwritten notepad sheet and thanked me for my assistance. The city engineers worked the same way, and they were overwhelmed by the demand.

I could afford to do this only for three days because my presence was needed back in my office on the 25th.

I have reviewed many buildings during these three days, and the most remarkable was a three-story apartment house on a corner lot. Due to the peculiar interaction of building shape and underlying soil under the effect of seismic shockwaves, this building collapsed and flattened the first and second floors as a pancake, so that the third-floor windows were at the level of the sidewalk. The walls of the building were tilted to about 75 degrees to the horizontal. This was the most photographed building and it was featured in every TV show and magazine covers. It was like a symbol of the majestic and unstoppable power of the earthquake.

William (Bill) Logan, the owner of this building approached me requesting safety assessment and soft demolition. I entered the building through a third-floor window which now was at the level of the sidewalk and made my way up to the roof in order to assess the condition of the walls and floors. I remember waving from the crooked, sloping roof to Fahima, who watched my acrobatics from the street holding her breath.

I deemed the building a suitable candidate for soft demolition.

The handwritten thank you letter from Bill meant a lot for me, it represented the thanks and appreciation of many others I helped during those days.

William A. Logan, JR.
October 31, 1989

Dear Paul:

This is to express my sincere thanks for your help with my Marina District apartment building, and to give you an update on how things went.

Due solely to your efforts, I was able to save almost all of my personal belongings, including large items such all furniture. In addition, the other third floor tenants were also able to save almost all of their belongings.

After the third floor had been cleared, the demolition and removal began. Fortunately, the City and the demolition contractor were very cooperative in pulling down the building and the debris. As a result, the residents on the lower floors were able to retrieve many of their personal items.

Paul, I cannot begin to thank you enough for what you did – you helped not only me, but also the other residents in the building. I hope that we can keep in touch.

Very truly yours,
Bill Logan