Northern California Earthquake: Red Flagged and Displaced Before Christmas

Rio Del, California –

As aftershocks rattled and crews worked across Humboldt County Wednesday afternoon to restore water and power wrecked by the powerful earthquake earlier this week, Kevin McNeese rushed to his former home, hoping to outsmart a law enforcement team so he could grab some His property was blocked prior to arrival.

it is too late. The quake-hit structure had already been red-flagged by the time MacNeese, 37, a sawmill mechanic, arrived to try to salvage some of his possessions, including his beloved music collection, which is worth thousands of dollars.

Kevin MacNeese stands outside his Rio del home that was “red-flagged” – no longer livable – due to damage from Tuesday’s 6.4-magnitude earthquake. He was sleeping in a nearby Scotia Lodge.

(Mackenzie Mays/Los Angeles Times)

He could only look helplessly through what was once his kitchen window at the damage: cupboards exploding, fireproof stains on the ceiling and shattered glass everywhere.

The house fell off its stilts and broke into three separate pieces. A fire broke out in the kitchen. The water started spurting out. He and his cat, Gamora, rushed to safety. But what now?

One day after a 6.4-magnitude earthquake shook these rural redwood towns, killing two people and injuring at least 17 others, it was clear that the community of Mcniece in Rio Del, a lumber town built on the rapids of the Elle River, had bear the brunt. from harm.

“I was homeless in about 20 seconds,” said McNessy.

It was a blow this community of 3,400 could hardly bear. Hit by the decades-old decline of the lumber industry, nearly three-quarters of the kids in the school district qualify for free or reduced-price lunch.

And now there are dozens of red flagged buildings and many residents made homeless just days before Christmas. Officials said the total cost of the damage has yet to be determined. Most of the city is under a boiling water regime, assuming the water comes out of their taps at all. “A lot of leaks,” said Mayor Debra Garnes of her town’s broken water system.

“We had ham and everything,” said Rio Del resident John Ireland of his plans to cook Christmas dinner for his 72-year-old mother, Anita Ireland. “And now we may be on the street.”

Ireland and his mom and pet pup, Sarah, have been living out of her 2007 Toyota Camry ever since an earthquake woke them up in the wee hours of darkness on Tuesday. They later learn that their home in Rio Del has been described as unsafe.

Rio Del Assistant Fire Chief Ryan Hossler, left, hugs a woman named Patty, who did not want to give her last name, as firefighters try to put out the flames in her home Wednesday.

(Godofredo A. Vasquez/The Associated Press)

“I grabbed my shoes and my blanket, that’s pretty much it,” said Anita Ireland. “We slept in the parking lot last night and maybe tonight, until some help comes.”

The quake occurred at 2:34 am, and its epicenter was offshore. Tear along a crevasse on the shore and travel northeast through ancient lumber towns south of the county seat of Eureka, a place filled with thick forests, cold fogs, and ruined local economies. It is a place so remote from the rest of California that many residents jokingly describe themselves as living on an island. The region is also accustomed to earthquakes: tsunami warning signs are posted at regular intervals blatantly along local streets and small earthquakes are ignored by most residents. But many residents said this earthquake felt louder, longer and noisier.

Many showed up on Wednesday filled with fear. But the fragility of a natural disaster revealed itself in the very different impact it had on the population in towns only minutes apart. For some, this has led to homelessness; For others, just a few broken dishes. Outside Rio Del, many found themselves surprised and relieved to discover that the damage was not as bad as they had feared.

Across the Eel River from the Rio del Scotia, the community of less than 1,000 seemed largely unscathed. Most of the early 20th century historic buildings that line Main Street are intact. Only a couple of broken windowpanes marred the Southern Trinity Health Services building on B Street – an old Victorian hospital perched on a hill overlooking the local sawmill and the River Eel.

Electricity was restored to the town on Wednesday afternoon, though the sawmill was still out of order. A few workers walked around the yards and facilities. John Andersen, director of forest policy at Humboldt and Mendocino Redwood Co. It is one of the largest employers in the region – with around 200 mill operators, loggers, biologists, geologists and sawmill engineers in Scotia. All employees every hour.

A house damaged by an earthquake in Rio Del, California, on Tuesday.

(Godofredo A. Vasquez/The Associated Press)

Andersen said employees at the lumber company had gone to Costco in Ukiah the day before and fetched as much water as they could. They took him back to the Rio del Firehouse. With power outages in the community, residents did not have access to drinking water.

“I suspect that in the coming days and weeks we will probably help support these towns by contributing potential lumber” or creating similar funds to help the town rebuild. The lumber company, he said, is determined to help these communities fend off the advancing “rural blight.”

Despite the magnitude of the earthquake, elsewhere in the province, life was returning to routine.

In Ferndale, a Victorian town of 1,300 that relies heavily on tourism, some worried that power shortages and the closure of Fernbridge, built across the Eel River in 1911 to connect Ferndale to US 101, could deal a devastating blow during the critical holiday season. .

But the historic bridge reopened on Wednesday afternoon. Power is also back in holiday light strings and lighting.

Carolyn Titus, who published and edited Ferndale Enterprise magazine until she sold it last year and who also owns two Airbnb rentals, said she’s heard from guests scheduled for Christmas and New Year’s that they keep coming.

“We’re completely back to normal,” she said Wednesday afternoon. She said only some windows in town were broken.

Titus said she wasn’t surprised that Ferndale rebounded so quickly: in an area so used to seismic activity, she said, that all of the city’s buildings had been modernized. A magnitude 6.2 earthquake struck exactly one year ago.

If she had to survive earthquakes, she said, “I’d rather be here where nothing will fall on you” than in a big city elsewhere in California.

Ourika, the largest city in the region with a population of 26,000, was badly shocked by the earthquake, as residents woke up to crumbling shelves, broken glass and the darkness of a power outage.

The city, once a center of the lumber industry, has become increasingly dependent on tourism, as cruise ships have begun appearing in Humboldt Bay and sending visitors down the streets of its charming old town.

Timmy Ramirez, left, looks on at his mother’s boyfriend, Bunny Bailey, as they walk into Bailey’s apartment in Rio Del. A powerful earthquake shook a rural area of ​​Northern California early Tuesday, waking residents, cutting power to thousands of people, and damaging some buildings and roads, officials said.

(Godofredo A. Vasquez/The Associated Press)

The Solstice shop in Old Town, which sells handmade goods and food, was back up and running within 24 hours, said employee Raylena Crexton. “Honestly, I was kind of hoping for an Amish three-day getaway,” she said. “But the electricity is back on, so we’re back on, too.”

Tourists returned too, running in and out of gift shops, clothing stores, and coffee shops. The damp, gloomy city streets were warmed by Christmas lights and holiday displays.

Very few merchandise were damaged, said Cadence Knight, sales associate at Land of Lovely – a gift shop on 2nd Street -. The china and glassware lining the shelves had hardly moved. “It was the wooden cutting boards that got the worst,” she said.

Up the hill from Old Town, Padma and Akash Tagars, visitors from Tucson, Arizona, brave the Sequoia Park Zoo’s Redwood Skywalk—a 100-foot-high suspension bridge. “The earthquake didn’t really slow us down,” Padma Tagaris said. “We had trouble getting coffee yesterday.”

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