earthquake safety

An effort to jump-start the pace of earthquake retrofits to vulnerable, older school buildings in Washington state has passed the legislature unanimously. The Evergreen State has lagged behind other West Coast states and provinces in reinforcing schools to withstand strong shaking.

The January 15 volcanic eruption near Tonga was a stark reminder of the threats posed by tsunamis. That's long been a concern in the Pacific Northwest, where thousands of students go to school within reach of a large tsunami. Oregon and Washington have been plugging away at retrofitting schools to withstand earthquakes. But the burden of relocating low-lying schools falls largely on local taxpayers. A vote-by-mail school bond election now underway in a coastal section of Grays Harbor County, Washington, will test voter appetite to pay higher taxes to build tsunami-safe schools.

Tens of thousands of public school students in Washington state returned to classes this month in school buildings judged to be at risk of collapse in a strong earthquake. A new report to the state legislature prepared by state geologists and a structural engineering firm gave the lowest possible seismic safety rating to more than 90 percent of the school buildings assessed in a selective statewide survey.

Smartphone users who opted in to a test of the West Coast earthquake early warning system got an early taste on Thursday of what is to come. Mobile phones…

Thousands of old brick, stone and concrete buildings in the Pacific Northwest could crumble in the next strong earthquake. To face that challenge,…

It's a sad fact of life that K-12 students must practice for calamities such as earthquakes, fires, lockdowns or active shooters. Now a few public schools…

Construction is underway on the Oregon coast for a new earthquake-hardened marine science building. It will have Oregon's first tsunami vertical…

More people than ever—1.2 million in Washington state and more than 570,000 in Oregon—are registered to participate in the annual Great ShakeOut…

Big earthquakes happen infrequently enough in the Northwest that people can be lulled into complacency. That’s not the case in Japan.Most large Japanese…

Federal agencies and university scientists are making progress on the deployment of an earthquake early warning system for the West Coast. That was one of…