March 2001
February 28th is my birthday. On February 28th, 2001, I turned 28 years old. I am told that this is called your “golden birthday”, and because it happens only once in your life you’re supposed to get a very special present. My friends threw me a little party the night before, and we had a great time. I went to bed happy, thinking that the company of my friends was an appropriately wonderful gift. I guess some people are so lucky that their golden birthday is accompanied by two special presents.
The earthquake hit at 10:55 AM PST. At the time I was in a conference room on the fourth floor of my company's building discussing a project with my co-workers Erin and Michael.
"So Scott and I will start training everyone as soon the program is finished," Erin said.
"Oh…no..." Michael whimpered.
Erin and I are pretty good at training people, so I thought Michael's response was rather odd. Then I noticed that the entire building was swaying from side to side, and it occurred to me that maybe he had something else on his mind.
It's interesting how the mind attempts to reconcile an earthquake. It's so odd to feel movement in a "solid" structure like a building that your brain considers every other possible option. At first I thought it was a truck going by. Then I thought it was a bunch of people running through the hall. Then my mind went completely blank, and I seemed to lose control of my body. I stood up for no good reason. Erin dove under the table. Michael looked out the window. (Apparently Erin's reaction is the one recommended by earthquake experts. Go figure.) When I finally realized that we were having an earthquake, I said, rather dreamily, "Well, should we get in the doorway?" For some reason Erin and Michael listened to me, and the three of us huddled in the doorway, clutching the door frame and each other, waiting for the shaking to stop.
The quake lasted for roughly one minute. It seemed like forever. It lasted so long that we had enough time to get over the initial panic, comprehend what was happening, anticipate the end, and then, when the end didn't come, start panicking again. Just when it seemed time for everything to stop, the shaking would get worse. All I really remember is feeling Erin’s fingernails digging into my side, and then looking around wondering how much worse it was going to get. I’m proud to say that I didn’t freak out, though. My interest in the situation seemed almost academic; I remember finding that a little disturbing.
Finally, it stopped. I vaguely remember wandering aimlessly through the halls for a minute or two. My reverie was interrupted by our HR administrator, Annette, who was running around in a panic yelling at everyone to go outside. I started to obey, but then I stopped myself: in the event of an aftershock, would I rather be on top of a collapsed building or underneath it? I decided that the building would offer better protection than the street. (Earthquake awareness has taken over Seattle in the last decade, so most of the newer buildings are pretty quake-proof. Most of the damage was to older buildings.) I decided to stay inside.
I ran into my friend Jim in the hall. He was inspecting the floor, which appeared to be cracked in a few places. After this revelation, he went home to check his apartment, which has a rather shaky balcony. This triggered my first thought of personal property damage: my car. It was parked in the garage six levels below. Oddly, I wasn't too concerned about the building collapsing on it. I was more worried that a light or a piece of pipe might have smashed my windshield or scratched my paint. This is the kind of horrible devastation that you have nightmares about: "EARTHQUAKE ROCKS SEATTLE; LOCAL MAN'S CAR SCRATCHED". I was anxious to see if it was OK, but I was nervous about braving the elevators. I decided to check my office first.
Thankfully, the office was in pretty good shape. A lot of my CDs had fallen on the floor, and some of my books had tumbled off of the shelf. Other than that, there was no damage. I didn't bother picking anything up. Rather, I pointlessly put my coat on and started my meandering again. I heard someone cleaning up glass from a broken computer monitor. I passed by our drink fridge and noticed that all of the Coke cans had fallen down and were blocking the sliding door on one side. A friend and I leapt into action, heroically clearing the obstruction and restoring access to the juice side of the fridge. This was no doubt a comfort to our co-workers, and we congratulated ourselves on our selfless act. It was here, as we drank our celebratory apple juice, that we heard the bad news: Lippy had passed away.
My boss was out of the country at the time and he had brought his family's pet lizard, Lippy, into the office so that we could care for it in his absence. Apparently the earthquake knocked the aquarium onto the floor and buried Lippy in the dirt that lined the bottom. A rescue crew dug him out, but it was too late. Upon his extraction from the dirt he was moving even less than he usually did, and his little lizard eyes were slits. (I later found out that an employee from another floor, a lizard expert, heard the news and came running upstairs to try to perform lizard CPR on Lippy. Alas, she was unsuccessful.) We have not received an official determination about the cause of death, but speculation ranges from suffocation to heart attack. Poor Lippy. He had been among us for only three days, and he was pretty cute, as lizards go. My boss's kids were not going to be happy when they found out.
The remainder of the day was pretty much a wash for most of us. The rest of my meetings were cancelled, as many people were going home to check their houses and their families. After about an hour I went down to the parking garage to check my car. (I took the stairs.) Luckily, my car's finish was undisturbed. I felt foolish having walked all that way to check on my paint, so I got in and drove home to assess the situation there. Luckily, the impact was minimal. My power was out for a while, a few pictures were hanging crooked, and my dresser had fallen over. It was here that I discovered my only property damage: the runner on my bottom dresser drawer got bent, thus preventing it from sliding into the track properly. I estimate the damage at roughly $1.59. I'm still debating whether or not I should claim it on my insurance.
Since my power was out I decided to take emergency action: I ate all of the ice cream that was in my freezer. I had no idea when the power would be restored, and I knew that the ice cream would melt if it sat around much longer. I'd already lost a drawer runner that day, so it seemed senseless to double my losses by abandoning perfectly good ice cream. My birthday lunch therefore consisted of me sitting on the floor, eating a huge bowl of ice cream and reading a book. Not bad.
I went back to work, but few people were working. As my friend Cara, a California native, told me, "An earthquake isn't real until you discuss it with someone." Most people were in the halls trading stories or sitting at their desks trying to call friends on the phone. (The land line circuits and cell networks were jammed for most of the afternoon.) I had birthday plans in Seattle that evening, so I cut out early. It was on the highways of Seattle that I encountered the biggest shock of the day: there was hardly any traffic. I guess every cloud does have a silver lining.
Over the subsequent 36 hours we were able to do a better job of surveying the damage, and not everyone got away clean. Somehow my Palm Pilot got its brains scrambled during the earthquake which resulted in complete memory loss. My friend Aaron's TV fell off of its stand and crushed his Playstation 2. (It might be a little poetic if it weren't so sad. He spent weeks on eBay finding it.) Ed and Meredith just bought a house, and part of its chimney collapsed and fell to the ground. When I say "just bought", I mean it literally; the sale closed minutes before the quake.
This is all minor stuff, thankfully. Few people were injured, and most of the things that were broken would be replaced. If I sound a little flip about the whole thing, it's mainly out of relief. Ever since the earthquake I've been seeing things in a different light: buildings, bridges, office furniture, racks of computers. They're everyday items, but in an earthquake they become fearsome. We were very lucky.
There isn't much a person can do, I suppose - the earth will quake when it chooses - but it certainly puts things in perspective. All you can do is be prepared. That’s probably the best lesson anyone can learn from this experience, and I’m taking it to heart. For my next birthday, I’m asking for earthquake insurance, some spare drawer runners, and maybe some touch up paint for my car. Just in case.
EPILOGUE: A few days after the quake, Ed and Meredith had FEMA come out to look at the damage to their chimney. A week later they received a check in the mail from the government for $3000 to pay for the repairs. They did not have to pay it back.