The Great Washington ShakeOut

It’s 8:16 on a chilly, wet morning in early spring. You’ve just arrived at work and are pouring a cup of coffee when you become aware of a low rumbling noise. Within seconds, the rumbling becomes a roar, the floor beneath you heaves, and the building begins to pitch and shake so violently that you’re thrown to the floor. The roaring is joined by a cacophony of crashing as windows shatter and every unsecured object in the room—from the desk chair to the coffee pot—is sent flying. Shaken loose by the shuddering and jolting of the building, dust and ceiling particles drift down like snow. Then the lights flicker and go out. Remembering to “drop, cover, and hold,” you crawl under the nearest table, hold on tight, and tell yourself that the shaking should last only a few seconds more . . . but it goes on and on.

This is it: the Big One. The Cascadia subduction zone has just unleashed a magnitude 9.0 earthquake.

This fun-filled scenario begins the latest report from the Cascadia Region Earthquake Workgroup. Pretty nifty, huh? I mean, who knew the “Big One” was actually brewing along the British Columbia, Washington and Oregon coast, rather than the more commonly recognized earthquake-prone Bay Area of California? Nobody until the 1970s, as it turns out. That’s when some smarty pants discovered there’d been a whopper of a quake here in 1700.

[Which calls for a correction to my prior statement: There were indeed already people who knew about the 1700 earthquake — the Native Americans unfortunate enough to reside along the northwest coastline at that time. They knew it intimately.]

The fun doesn’t stop there, either. Apparently, we’re overdue for another one. And while the most recent findings show the fault zone is farther out in the ocean than they’d initially thought, meaning the shaking won’t be quite so severe (Yay!), the resultant tsunami will likely be more intense and damaging (Aw crap).

As some of you already know, John and I live close to the water. We’re not on the western coast of Washington but our bay — Discovery Bay — is attached to the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the waters of which flow in from the Pacific.

In the office here at Cape George there’s a map showing which houses might wind up under water in the event of a tsunami. Ours is not one of them. In fact, our house sits 50 feet higher still than the highest tsunami targets, which should be enough to assuage my wall-of-water fears.

Yep, it sure should be.

It isn’t.

See, I’m not good at threats of natural disasters. Man-made ones aren’t a favorite of mine either but wow, those natural ones are real doozies. Hurricanes, floods, avalanches, tornadoes. Especially tornadoes. Growing up in Central Indiana, tornadoes were a part of life. In fact, my favorite aunt and uncle’s house was flattened by one when I was a child. I’ll never forget my cousin’s nightmarish recollections of being buried under the rubble, screaming, each breath sucking in mouthfuls of crushed mortar.

I’d thought we were getting away from that when we relocated to the Texas Hill Country but no, oh no, there are plenty of twisters there too. Every spring I watched terrified as the local weatherman displayed ominous radar images filled with blobs of red, purple and even black, punctuated by multiple swirling, twirling discs indicating tornadic activity moving our way. How nice, then, to move to western Washington where tornadoes are all but unheard of. No more natural disaster worries!

Until I read in further detail about this.

Then just last week came The Great Washington ShakeOut earthquake preparedness drill. From what I gather, when the Big One hits you’re supposed to dive under a table and hold tight to its legs until the shaking stops. Then, if you’re near the water, you’re to run like hell uphill as fast as your legs can scamper.

Simple as that. Oh, except you should also keep plenty of emergency supplies on hand — non-perishable food, a first aid kit, toiletries, a battery operated radio. Things like that. We’ve started to load up a closet in our basement, one that’s supported by two concrete walls and hopefully fairly shake-proof.

It isn’t finished yet. For instance, we have no portable propane cookstove or pots and pans. We do have a wok, a wooden salad bowl and charcoal, however, plenty enough for a festive backyard post-apocalyptic stir-fry. We even have a vase full of fake Gerbera daisies for decoration and a Cuisinart ice cream maker we can stare at wistfully until the electricity [maybe] comes back on.

I learned from a neighbor that shortly after the 2011 tsunami disaster in Japan, an earthquake expert of some sort came to Cape George to sum up what might happen here if the Big One were to occur.

He said Diamond Point (the piece of land sticking out in the water on the left) and Protection Island (the island in the distance on the right), as well as the Dungeness Spit farther west would help temper any tsunami waves barreling towards us through the Strait of Juan de Fuca. (I’m guessing the electric pole smack in the center of this photo won’t be much help in that regard.) Good news, right? Sure, until we get to his next prediction: Should an earthquake vibrate an enormous hunk of Protection Island into the bay,

the rush of displaced water will rise up and swallow Cape George whole.

After sharing this little factoid with me, my neighbor shrugged and pointed out once more that at least here in western Washington we don’t get major floods, tornadoes and the like. The Big One is really the only natural disaster we have to be concerned with.

Phew. What a relief.

Beware

Warnings abound.

No, no, I’m not talking about this one (though don’t think for a moment this one doesn’t creep me out). While tsunami warnings do indeed abound — there’s a similar sign in our neighborhood, in fact — there’s little to no day-to-day talk about the threat. The subject broached far more often, with a far greater sense of foreboding, is wintertime.

As most everyone knows, the weather is temperate in the Pacific Northwest. Winters are mild, especially as compared to other states as far north as Washington. Yet because we are so far north, we get a crazy fluctuation in daylight hours through the year. It’s not exactly the Land of the Midnight Sun but it’s one heck of a lot closer to it than anywhere else I’ve lived.

When John and I moved into our house in early June, light would start filtering through the window blinds well before 5 a.m., not to go dark again until long after 10:00 at night. Now that gap is narrowing, with darkness falling much closer to 9 p.m. We haven’t experienced a Washington winter yet, but John and I are getting a bit jittery over how much farther south the sun is setting nowadays, in addition to the relative earliness of the event.

From our deck last June, we’d watch the sun go down over Protection Island.

Since then, sunsets have slowly scooched to the left.

Although the weather has been the epitome of perfection for weeks on end — such unaltered perfection a rarity in this part of the country — good luck finding many folks around here able to sit back and relish it for what it is. When we comment about a beautiful day to a passerby on the street or someone working in one of the Port Townsend shops, half the time the response we get is something like, “Oh you should’ve been here last year. It didn’t get out of the 60’s until September!”

Our friends Varen and Walter, both of them long-time Washingtonians, often point out what a remarkable season it’s been. This past June, in particular, was apparently quite the anomaly. We’d been forewarned about June — how it tends to be cold and cloudy, thus earning the name “Junuary” — yet the month turned out to be mostly delightful. July was sublime; so far, August is following suit.

September is supposedly the finest month of all, and we’ve heard nary a disparaging remark about October. November, on the other hand, is a different story. In the spirit of full disclosure, Varen and Walter continue to fill us in on what’s to come beginning in November, and it sounds most dire. From what they’ve told us, I’m envisioning November and December as something like this:

Maybe that’s a tiny exaggeration. However, the days are certain to be as short during those two months as they were long in June and July. And to be perfectly fair, no mention has been made of zombies. (We’ll just have to wait and see for ourselves on that one.)

This is probably a more realistic depiction of winter in Western Washington:

Should be fun. One thing I know for sure is it’ll be an ideal time for an extended vacation. South.

Ah, but unlike several of our neighbors who live here only half the year, John and I aren’t in a financial position to own both a summer home and a winter home, so our vacation won’t encompass the entirety of the darkest months. We’ll need to find something to do here, and I had been worried about keeping John occupied. He goes a little bonkers when he’s not outside working in the garden, and there is no gardening in this part of the world during the short days.

Fortunately, he just began some big projects: putting up more fencing, building a greenhouse, and terracing three sections of the yard to create additional level areas for growing food. Nine pallets of 65-pound blocks for the terraces arrived yesterday, four of them shown here.

I suspect he’ll stay busy well into the winter.

What will I do during that time? Well, when I’m not sitting by the fire reading a good book or working on a pile of crossword puzzles, I’m sure I’ll be peering out the windows, tracking John’s progress. At least until it gets too

It’s June

While we await our move to the new house (soon…very soon) we’ve been taking advantage of our access to the community gym and indoor lap pool just down the hill from our future abode. It’s a little weird for us, since we’ve never been gym people. For the past many years, our exercise regimen consisted of walking hither and yon on the farm every day. Treadmills, stationary recumbent bikes, rowing machines and stair steppers are new to both of us and while I wouldn’t say they’re “fun,” we at least feel like we’re doing some good for ourselves by walking, pedaling, rowing and stepping on them.

We do have a bit of an ulterior motive, however, above and beyond bodybuilding our way to becoming the new Mr. and Ms. Charles Atlas: going to the gym is a handy excuse for driving over to the new neighborhood. This past Saturday morning offered even more of a reward for huffing and puffing up mechanically-generated inclines, in that the previous owner (and current renter) of our house was moving a truckload of boxes to her new home in Seattle and was kind enough to allow us to barge in and eat our picnic lunch on the deck while she was gone.

I suspect the adult beverage we each enjoyed afterwards wouldn’t normally be considered part of a balanced workout discipline but hey, it was a beautiful afternoon. One that begged for beer.

That evening, thick clouds rolled in. There’s nothing unusual about this. In the course of one day, we can get clouds, then rain, then sunshine, then clouds, then drizzle, then sunshine again followed by rain. And by “rain” I mean not really rain, at least not in the sense we’re accustomed to.

On a recent schizophrenic weather day, John and I were leaving the local electric company’s office just as another customer came inside exclaiming, “Wow, it’s really coming DOWN!”

Obviously, that person has never lived in Texas. While we did cover our heads with our hoodies on the walk to the car, we drove off with the windshield wipers set at intermittent. I don’t know that we’ve ever needed them ramped up all the way to “On” more than a half hour total — and I’m talking an accumulated 30 minutes, not all at the same time — since we’ve been here.

The clouds do cool it off, though. We decided to walk to a restaurant for dinner Saturday night and I considered wearing my leather jacket. John scoffed. (We’re trying to behave more like hardy Northwesterners who don short sleeves at 55 degrees rather than the thin-skinned Texans we still are, who begin to get a chill when the temperature drops below 68.) I compromised by wearing a cardigan sweater instead.

After dinner we walked out to the pier to watch some sailboats taking off. I was cold, wishing I’d gone with my first instinct and worn the leather coat. Then it hit me.

“It’s June!” I cried, stunned at the sudden realization.

June. And I was pining for my coat. I couldn’t stop saying it — “It’s June!” — all the way back to the house. “It’s June! It’s JUNE!”

I wasn’t pleased.

The following day, we found out from our neighbor who’s lived in Port Townsend for 30-some years that the locals call this month ‘June-uary.’ As further explanation, he said, “You remember how it was last week, when it was in the low 50’s a few days? That’s why we call it June-uary!”

I refrained from pointing out that last week was still May.

We’d already heard from other folks that June in Western Washington does tend to be rather bleak, but I’m beginning to doubt them all now. Today the sky is blue, the sun is shining and the long-term forecast is for more of the same with temperatures hovering around 70 degrees. Personally, I’m still not ready to pull out the sleeveless t-shirts and shorts, but I sure don’t mind the idea of not worrying about leaving our jackets in the closet.

Yet come to think of it, judging from our experience with the weather here so far, I should probably keep in mind that anything could happen. After all, last week has passed. June-uary is just beginning.

Come on Out, the Weather’s Fine

So many dire warnings before we left Texas:

“You’re moving where?? You know it rains all the time in the Northwest, don’t you?”

“Washington, huh? Hope you like rain!”

“Oh, I’ve heard it’s pretty up there, but I wouldn’t be able to handle all that rain.”

“Sure, summers are nice; otherwise it’s always raining.”

Since we’ve been here in Washington, less rain has fallen than it has back in Austin. And the thing is, that trend will likely continue. See, Port Townsend is in the “rain shadow” of the Olympic Mountains. Average annual rainfall: about 19 inches.

This is what a rain shadow looks like from above:

Well, okay, it probably doesn’t look exactly like that. I’ve only ever flown to Seattle in the dark, but I doubt there are purple outlines and orange arrows up there even in the daytime. Still, imagine yourself waking from a nap on the plane only to open the window shade to see this. It’d be almost as alarming as that Twilight Zone episode with William Shatner.

Although we’ve seen the sun far more often than not during our tenure as Pacific Northwest residents, we’re not letting it lull us into a false notion of reality. We’re well aware that over the year as a whole, while we won’t get a lot of rainfall, clouds and gray skies will prevail. Even self-proclaimed “Sunny Sequim,” the nearby town that boasts its rain shadow locale more than any of the others, has been overcast two out of three times we’ve passed through it.

I mean, c’mon, it’s time for them to face facts. How sunny can it be and still grow moss on the Chamber of Commerce asphalt parking lot?

You know the hole in the clouds in the previous satellite image, where the orange arrows are pointing? We’ve witnessed this effect from ground level many times already. Often it’s overcast in the early morning — “early” meaning 7 to 8 a.m. in temporarily-retiredspeak — after which the sun breaks through and the clouds form a circle around Port Townsend, like a big donut. (Oh all right…probably around Sequim too, the braggart.) On those days, even with beautiful views of the water, clouds obscure the Olympic Mountains to the southwest and the Cascades to the east.

It’s a different story on perfectly clear days, like our first visit to lovely Chetzemoka Park when I was able to snap a clandestine GQ picture of John with Mount Rainier looking on.

By the way, according to the explanatory placard, the park was named for a Native American who was proclaimed a hero by European pioneers for warning them when his tribe was planning an ambush. “So he was a spy!” I exclaimed.

I guess it’s a matter of perspective.

We get a different view of the Cascades — one with Mount Baker hogging most of the attention — on our stroll into the downtown area,

unless the clouds are donutting. In that case, we see this:

The Olympic Mountains play a similar game of hide and seek. The day John arrived at the rental house in Port Townsend, the Olympics made for an impressive welcome wagon.

We can supposedly see these mountains from the house we’re getting ready to buy, as well, yet on all three visits to our soon-to-be home the donut remained stubbornly in place.

(Don’t get me wrong, however. I’m not complaining about our future view.)

Now, I’m not claiming to understand the rain shadow phenomenon from a scientific standpoint. I’m no scientist. Or climatologist. Or ist of any sort who’d be able to stay awake for the entire meteorological explanation. All I know is the weather patterns in this area are downright goofy. Take, for example, a graphic from one of the local news station’s radar showing wind speeds and directions.

I mean, really, who can make sense of that? John and I used to be forecast junkies, noting the nuances of each approaching front, able to almost predict the weather ourselves (at least as well as the people paid to do it on TV). But we don’t see it happening here. And while that’s not enough reason to make us want to relocate again, it will certainly crimp our style come each evening’s local newscast.

Of all the grievous warnings we received back in Texas, not one person mentioned we’d be moving to a place with so many crazy arrows.