San Francisco centennial

Disasters | Are Californians—and the rest of us—prepared for new disasters? | Marvin Olasky

At the beginning of the 20th century, San Francisco was the financial hub of the West, the eighth-largest city in the country, and a cosmopolitan cultural center that on April 17, 1906, featured a rousing performance of Carmen with the great tenor Enrico Caruso.

At 5:12 the next morning, a major earthquake turned parts of the city into rubble—and what the quake didn't get a fire created by broken gas mains did. More than 30,000 people lost their lives in San Francisco alone; after three days of fires, 225,000 of the city's 400,000 citizens were homeless.

But that's past; many San Franciscans next week will be commemorating the centennial of their city's worst day while worrying that one even harsher is yet to come. It sounds like an urban legend, but there apparently was a FEMA emergency training session in August 2001 during which participants agreed on the three major disasters most likely to strike the United States: a New York terrorist attack, a massive hurricane hitting New Orleans, and a major California earthquake.