Earthquakes 2: Vancouver

1. It's been implied that Vancouver is due for an earthquake, since the Cascadia fault has been quite silent. On average, the fault has an earthquake every 300 to 1000 years. Since the last big earthquake was in early 1700, provided from reports of an tsunami hitting Japan, the dead trees in the ghost forest in Washington, and the soil carbon dating.

2. The area around Vancouver is on a silty basin known as the Georgia basin. The area also has the Strait of Georgia that Vancouver is on the coast of. Vancouver Island is on the left of the Strait of Georgia.

3. a) In terms of liquefaction, cities in the Vancouver are at risk to it (especially Richmond) since Vancouver is in the silty Georgia Basin. Houses built on mountainsides like in
Coquitlam or roads on mountainsides like Highway 5 are risk to landslides because of loose rocks or soil coming down because of a major shock.

Any city on a coast like Tofino and even Vancouver are at more risk to tsunamis as they are cities close to water after all. Vancouver Island is more likely to shield Vancouver a little bit from a tsunami, but a giant tidal wave like that would sweep cars off roads, among other things. Finally flooding is probably the most worrying issue, as cities like Richmond would become literal swamps after the tsunami wrecks it's way through.

b) The social impact would be quite harsh when the big one hits here. It's calculated that 400 to 800 people would perish from the quake and tsunami alone. Many more would be injured and/or homeless as well. Economically it would also be a disaster, as it's estimated that the quake alone would cause over 150 million dollars, with it rising more when the tsunami hits. On infrastructure, it depends on the stability and if it's was built to withstand such a natural disaster. Worst case, a skyscraper collapses or something else is decimated. Newer structures should fare better than older ones, as the codes of building have switched over the years. Areas like Gastown are at larger risks than rural Surrey for example just because of Gastown's older structures being weaker since they were built using older methods or been standing for a long time.

4. Metro Vancouver in terms of preparing for that earthquake have been quite lacklustre, in fact many say that nothing a

has been done to prepare at all. They have however, done things such as reinforce weaker structures (upgrading the Granville Street bridge) and things like earthquake drills to prepare people for what to do when the big one hits.