The earthquake occurred February 9, 1971, at 6:00:41 am Pacific Standard time.
The night before after spending Christmas with my parents because my father was in between Electrical Jobs for the San Diego Electrical Union we were living Near Yucca Valley on the high desert then. IN 1971 I would have been 23 years old and soon after this I and my parents returned to Rancho Bernardo after my father got a new job building the Carlsbad Power station for I believe Southern California Edison then. He retired in 1980 from this job I believe.
So, the night before my mother and I had wanted to see the "Mash(1970) in Palm Springs which is about a 45 minute to 60 minute drive from Yucca Mesa to Palm Springs. So, we returned to the house on Yucca Mesa out in the high desert there and I woke up to my head banging against the wall in this terrible earthquake.
At first I thought it would pass like most earthquakes tend to with little fuss and not much damage then.
However, I was wrong because pictures started coming off the walls and things were falling out of cupboards and breaking and things were falling off desks and counters everywhere. At this point I was truly scared for my life and my parents lives and I tried to stand up but couldn't without falling down. So, I sat down on the bed and bounced around for awhile. and it seemed to just keep getting worse and worse. At this point I thought it might be a nuclear blast from Russia. However, when it started to settle down and I turned on the radio to find out what was wrong it had just been the biggest earthquake anyone had seen in California in a long long time.
I was relieved that it hadn't been the start of a nuclear war and that it was only an earthquake (an act of God) that killed at least 65 people and collapsed freeways and houses all over southern California.
However, this was the most terrifying earthquake outside of the 5.0 when my daughter was in a pool with water sloshing out of it on a floatie and I wanted her not to get a concussion by being slammed against the cement sides of the pool at that time.
Though it took us a few hours to clean up all the glass the bigger problem for me was to get to shoes so I wouldn't have serious broken glass issues with the bottom of my feet but I mostly succeeded in getting to my shoes or sandals then so I didn't have serious glass injuries into the bottoms of my feet from broken glass everywhere in the house then. So, every broom and dust pan was very busy for several hours until we could then vacuum up the last vestiges of glass from all the rooms in the house up on Yucca Mesa above Yucca Valley then.
begin quotes regarding Mash(1970):
No comments:
Post a Comment