How much would the 1906 quake cost today?

Jennifer London Correspondent

SAN FRANCISCO — Hurricane Katrina was a natural disaster in the true sense of the word. When the violent winds stopped howling, and the flood waters retreated, death and destruction were everywhere, the likes of which many had never seen before.

But long before Katrina, one of our nation’s worst natural disasters struck the west coast of California and all but destroyed the booming city of San Francisco.

At 5:12 a.m., on April 18, 1906 the ground started shaking at first light. The violent earthquake lasted less than a minute, but leveled downtown.

Within minutes dozens of fires broke out across the city and the ruptured water mains made it impossible for the small fire crews to beat back the flames, and for three days, those that survived, watched helplessly as their city burned.

The estimated 7.8 magnitude quake destroyed 28,000 of the city’s 53,000 buildings. In just 28 seconds City Hall, which had taken 27 years to build, was reduced to an unrecognizable pile of rubble.

NBC VIDEO Calculating the impact April 17: How bad would the 1906 earthquake be if it were to strike today? A new study indicates the toll would be staggering. NBC's George Lewis reports. Nightly News

The quake and fires left a quarter of a million people homeless. It’s estimated that as many as 6,000 people died as a result of the quake and ensuing firestorm that swept through the city.

Thanks to a combination of determination, enterprise, and entrepreneurial spirit, San Francisco rebuilt, but what would the economic cost be if a similar disaster occurred in the city of the Golden Gate today?

What would the cost be in 2006 dollars? 
What about the next horrible earthquake? Expert says it’s not a matter of if the next big one hits, it’s a matter of when. And the stakes are higher today, in part because of the explosive population growth. Since 1906 the Bay Area has grown by a factor of 10.

“There were 10 times fewer buildings because there were 10 times fewer people,” said earthquake engineer, Charles Kircher. “The buildings were also worth less than 50 percent of what they currently are, so in fact, buildings are now valued at 500 times what they were in 1906.”

How big was the 1906 earthquake? Levels of magnitude quoted for the 1906 San Francisco earthquake vary from the low sevens to the high eights. Which is correct? That's difficult to pin down, in part because data for the 1906 earthquake are often poor because of the relatively unsophisticated technology of the period and also because most of the few stations in existence back then were not in optimum locations. Two recent studies — one consolidating measurements taken at almost 100 observatories around the world and the other examining ground deformation caused by the quake — have put the disaster at magnitude 7.7 to 7.9. SOURCE: U.S. Geological Survey

Kircher has spent more than 30 years studying the economic impact of a major earthquake and said today’s price tag for a quake the size of the 1906 quake will be staggering.

“The total economic loss for the region, just due to damaged buildings and the contents of the buildings is estimated to be a little over $120 billion.”

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