For the past few weeks, the LA Times has led in its big Sunday editions with stories revealing how the city of Los Angeles and the state of California have turned a blind eye to seismic risk, despite many urgents warnings from scientists.
After the 1971 Sylmar earthquake, California began an ambitious effort to map faults across the state.
Over the next two decades, officials published 534 maps of active earthquake faults. New construction was prohibited on top of these fissures because previous quakes showed that buildings could be torn apart during violent shaking.
But the mapping campaign has slowed to a crawl — with many dangerous faults still undocumented.
For the same paper, Ted Rall tells the same story — entertainingly.
In my experience, the more you read about seismic risk in CA, the more you are likely to freak out.
Kit Stolz 