Experts warn the San Andreas fault is ‘ready to go’

by Isabelle Z.

As Californians go about their daily lives, many of them remain blissfully unaware of the threat lurking in the background: a monster earthquake that scientists say is long overdue.

Southern California Earthquake Center director, Thomas Jordan, remarked that the fault has been unusually uneventful since 1857, when the last big earthquake to hit a southern section struck the area from Monterey County to the San Gabriel Mountains near L.A., in a quake that registered 7.9 on the Richter scale.

Scientists are now saying that arrival of the type of massive earthquake that normally strikes every few hundred years is just a matter of time, and it could leave thousands or even tens of thousands of people dead or homeless in its wake.

Jordan told the National Earthquake Conference in Long Beach, “The springs on the San Andreas system have been wound very, very tight and the southern San Andreas fault, in particular, looks like it’s locked, loaded and ready to go.”

He added that other areas of the fault, which measures 810 miles in total, are also highly vulnerable. Scientists believe that the Pacific plate should move northwest of the North American plate about 16 feet every century in order to relieve stress, but this has not been happening, which means that stress has been building up to unsustainable levels for more than 100 years.

Jordan feels that the state needs to prepare itself for such a devastating event, and commended the city of Los Angeles for its plans to reinforce the city’s older buildings made of concrete, as well is its telecommunications networks. The fault does not run under the city itself, but could rock it nevertheless.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey, a 7.8-magnitude quake could cause as many as 1,800 deaths, 50,000 injuries, and damages totaling $200 billion, in the course of just two minutes.

An earthquake of this magnitude has not been seen since 1857, when a quake that started in Parkfield, Monterey County, worked its way down the fault for 185 miles, before heading east from Los Angeles. The power of the quake caused it to liquefy soil and destroy countless buildings, although it is important to note that the areas affected were not nearly as built up at that time as they are now.

Next quake could be even worse than predicted

Making matters even worse, some experts believe that the next earthquake could coincide with one rippling along the adjacent San Jacinto fault line, which happens to run through more densely populated cities, and could escalate the devastation to much higher levels than predicted. This is what is believed to have occurred in 1812, and there is a strong chance that it could happen again, as past geological events are considered good indicators of future ones.

While Jordan praised L.A. for its preparedness, other experts believe that the area is not adequately prepared for such a devastating natural disaster.
Professor Lisa Grant Ludwig of the University of California said, “In southern California, much of our infrastructure was built to withstand a rupture of either the San Andreas or San Jacinto faults, but not both at the same time.”

California officials have been working together with state and military officials to set out plans for what to do when “The Big One” strikes. It is believed that civilian and military personnel and equipment would be deployed, including cargo planes, ships and helicopters, along with thousands of soldiers, emergency officials and medical personnel.

The Washington State Army National Guard’s Lt. Col. Clayton Braun said, “The response will be orders of magnitude larger than Hurricane Katrina or Super Storm Sandy.”

Preparedness is key to surviving a natural disaster

With experts predicting that a 7.8-magnitude San Andreas fault quake could cut off all four of the area’s aqueducts at one time – thereby cutting off more than 70 percent of Southern California’s water supply – it is important for people to be aware of the possibilities and prepare accordingly.

People living in the area and its surroundings need to prepare themselves for the possibility of being cut off from electricity, food, water and lines of communication and transportation. In addition, it is important to keep in mind that law enforcement can become so overwhelmed in such events that criminals and opportunists could get away with widespread burglary and looting. Therefore, it is essential to have a good supply of drinkable water, nutritious food that does not need to be cooked, a battery-powered radio, water filtration devices, emergency medical supplies and self-defense items, to name just a few.

The next earthquake is a question of when, not if, and those who take adequate measures now have the best chance of survival.

Meanwhile the US is already planning their next major coup

by Claire Bernish

A nonviolent coup to depose a democratically-elected president and install some of the most corrupt politicians — who, not coincidentally happen to be favored by the U.S. political establishment — is currently underway in Brazil. As the public’s attention zeroes on the readying of troops for deployment to Syria, the U.S. government has been able to quietly lend its approval to the crooked and baseless move to oust Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff.

Indeed, though the controversy over quintupling U.S. ground troops in Syria — despite vows by the Obama administration at least 16 times there would be ‘no boots on the ground’ — constitutes a valid and pertinent debate, it can’t be allowed to obfuscate what’s taking place in Brazil.

To understand the importance of the ongoing tumult, you need only look at who matters to both the Brazilian and U.S. political elite — and it clearly isn’t the 54 million people who re-elected Brazil’s first female president just 18 months ago.

In fact, the U.S. State Department has all but publicly asserted its support for the usurpation of power by Brazil’s center-right Social Democracy Party (PDSB) — perhaps because, as has been suggested by many, U.S. fingerprints are all over the coup. What better way to thwart Brazil’s successful dealings with Russia and China, as part of the BRICS economic alliance, than to insert an oligarchical leader whose party heavily favors U.S. interests.

First, it’s necessary to revisit the mechanics of the coup as well as the controversy surrounding those involved.

Brazil’s lower house of Congress voted to impeach Rousseff on April 17 on the premise of her alleged complicity in albeit relatively minor corruption. But the true impetus for Rousseff’s removal, contrary to the narrative championed by Brazil’s corporate media, is transparently evidenced in those calling for it — and in whom they wish to replace her with.

Bruno Araújo, a congressman who has been implicated as possibly receiving funds from a construction giant embroiled in a corruption scandal, helped tip the vote for impeachment earlier this month. Araújo, as the Intercept reported, belongs to the same PDSB party that lost four elections in a row to Rousseff’s Worker’s Party (PT).

“[T]he most important means for understanding the truly anti-democratic nature of what’s taking place,” the Intercept’s Glenn Greenwald explained, “is to look at the person whom Brazilian oligarchs and their media organs are trying to install as president: the corruption-tainted, deeply unpopular, oligarch-serving Vice President Michael Temer.”

For all the negative attention trained on Rousseff, Temer’s unpopular image and duplicitous dealings are worse, and could be worthy of his own impeachment proceedings. And he isn’t alone.

“Altogether, 60 percent of the 594 members of Brazil’s Congress face serious charges like bribery, electoral fraud, illegal deforestation, kidnapping and homicide,” as The New York Times cited corruption watchdog, Transparency Brazil.

But PDSB seeks to bypass that not-at-all minor detail through Rouseff’s impeachment — which, if successful, would automatically bring Temer to power — much to the satisfaction of the United States government.

To wit, another major figure pushing for the removal of Rousseff, Senator Aloysio Nunes, traveled to Washington, D.C., the day after the impeachment vote to consult with the third most powerful State Department official, Thomas Shannon, in a closed-door meeting.

As co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Mark Weisbrot, explained in an article for the Huffington Post, Shannon had no obligatory duty to meet with Nunes — but his doing so sent a clear message of at least tacit acceptance of the impeachment proceedings by the White House.

U.S. support of the current coup echoes that of the previous Brazilian coup in 1964 — a violent usurpation of power by U.S.-friendly dictator, during which Dilma Rousseff, herself, became a victim of physical torture.

But perhaps the most telling indication of U.S. support for deposing Rousseff can be found in a detail of Nunes recent Washington trip. As the Intercept’s Andrew Fishman explained in an interview with Democracy Now, Nunes was a guest at a private luncheon thrown by the Albright Stonebridge Group — a firm cofounded by the former CEO of Kellogg and Madeleine Albright, former secretary of state under Bill Clinton.

“[O]ne of the senior advisers affiliated with the Albright Stonebridge Group,” Fishman, who is located in Brazil, noted, “is the leader of an organization down here that’s very involved in the push against the Dilma government.”

He added that “while the U.S. government hasn’t made any official stance” on Rousseff’s impending impeachment, “it seems pretty obvious as to what their stance is and which side they’re supporting or would support.”