A guide following the series of earthquakes that have shaken up Victoria
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The three recent earthquakes that shook the Greater Victoria Area in the span of two weeks are a good reminder that earthquakes do actually happen here. How is UVic equipped to deal with such a situation, and what can students do to prepare themselves?
“There’s always more work to do,” said Rob Johns, UVic’s manager of emergency planning.
Johns has been the emergency planner at the university for nine years. In this role, he is in charge of “everything from earthquakes to chemical spills to natural gas leaks,” he told the Martlet.
Johns has a number of teams that deal with particular emergencies. In the case of a more serious earthquake, he calls on an assortment of teams.
The Emergency Operations Centre team, consisting of 60 people, is an all-hazards team that trains throughout the year. If one of the recent earthquakes were to cause damage, this team would manage it.
If an earthquake were to cause damage to a building, the Site Response team would deal with the emergency hands-on. Another group would conduct a rapid damage assessment, following the standards of the B.C. government. These inspections occur to determine whether or not the building is safe to enter. UVic also has teams that help evacuate buildings when needed.
“Depending on the emergency and what’s needed in the emergency, we determine which of those people we would activate,” said Johns. “We’ve got a fairly robust, fairly well-understood management process to actually manage these kinds of events, like an earthquake.”
Johns said that individuals can always do more to prepare themselves for future emergencies. “My encouragement to everybody is to go and participate in [preparedness talks], learn what you can, ask questions to learn more and to clarify,” he said.
Lucinda Leonard, an associate professor in the Faculty of Earth and Ocean Sciences at UVic, said that the recent earthquakes are a reminder that there is a high seismic hazard in the Greater Victoria Area.
She says that one way we can prepare for more earthquakes is to practice the drop, cover, and hold method. “I make my students do [it] in classes that I teach,” said Leonard. “It develops muscle memory … [so] when the actual [earthquake] happens, you don’t have to think about what to do.”
According to Leonard, the three earthquakes that residents of the Greater Victoria Area felt in the last two weeks are not connected. The sources of each of the earthquakes were different.
She also said that each earthquake’s magnitude can be different depending on the area of the fault. But even with earthquake warning systems or other emergency alerts, if an epicentre is very close to a big population area, there is often not much time to evacuate. It can be important to have a go-bag ready to use in such emergencies.
One way students, staff, and faculty members can prepare themselves is by taking UVic’s emergency preparedness workshop. The 90-minute practical presentation happens twice a semester, and covers a variety of strategies to prepare for emergencies. The next session is happening on March 25.
In the future, Johns says that he hopes to have modules available on Brightspace that can be accessed by staff, faculty, and students to learn about emergency events and how to be prepared. He recommends a website called prepareyourself.ca, which has a compilation of emergency preparedness resources.
“Unfortunately, we don’t have a choice,” said Johns. “If an earthquake happens in the future that causes damage, we can’t stop it. But we can definitely be better prepared.”
