The National Earthquake

Hazards Reduction

Program 

Report to Congress for Fiscal Year 2003 and 2004

January 2005
Cover:

National Seismic Hazard 2003 .2 seconds map 

(USGS)
Contents

1 Executive Summary

4 I. Introduction

4 The National Earthquake Hazards Reduction

Program

5 The NEHRP Agencies

6 The NEHRP Partners 

6 Scope of This Report 

7 II. Achieving the Goals of the NEHRP 

7 NEHRP Accomplishments: Goal A

8 The NEHRP Agencies

12 Regional Consortia

15 Selected State,Territorial, and Local

Accomplishments

22 Other Organizations

26 NEHRP Accomplishments: Goal B

26 The NEHRP Agencies

30 Selected State,Territorial, and Local

Accomplishments

30 Other Organizations

33 NEHRP Accomplishments: Goal C

33 The NEHRP Agencies

36 Regional Consortia

37 Selected State,Territorial, and Local

Accomplishments

41 Other Organizations

42 NEHRP Accomplishments: Goal D

42 The NEHRP Agencies

48 Selected State,Territorial, and Local

Accomplishments

49 Other Organizations

53 III. Seismic Safety of Federal Buildings: A Progress Report

on Federal Agencies’ Implementation of Executive Orders

12699 and 12941

66 IV. Future Directions

69 Appendices

69 Appendix 1: List of Acronyms

72 Appendix 2: Executive Orders

72 Executive Order 12699

74 Executive Order 12941

i

In 1977, Congress passed the Earthquake Hazards Reduction

Act (Public Law 95-124), establishing the National

Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP), a longterm, national program to reduce the risks to life and

property in the United States from earthquakes.The NEHRP

agencies, which are described below, work separately and in

cooperation with each other and other federal and state

agencies, the private sector, universities, and regional,

voluntary, and professional organizations to improve the

Nation’s understanding of earthquake hazards, prepare for

earthquakes, and develop knowledge on best practices to

reduce earthquake damage.

The Earthquake Hazards Reduction Act of 1977 requires that

the Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency

(FEMA) shall:

“prepare, in conjunction with other Program

agencies, a biennial report, to be submitted to

the Congress within 90 days after the end of

each even-numbered fiscal year, which shall

describe the activities and achievements of the

Program during the preceding two fiscal years.”1

This report describes the progress of the NEHRP agencies and

their partners in Fiscal Year (FY) 2003 and 2004 in mitigating

earthquake losses through basic and directed research and

implementation activities in the fields of earthquake science

and engineering.The progress described in this report is

organized according to the four goals of the Strategic Plan for the

NEHRP for 2001-2005, Expanding and Using Knowledge To Reduce

Earthquake Losses (Strategic Plan).The four goals represent the

continuum of activities undertaken by the NEHRP agencies,

ranging from research and development to application and

implementation.The activities form a complementary

program that has the ultimate aim of reducing earthquake

losses across the Nation.

The foundation of the NEHRP is research, which underpins

nearly all of activities of the NEHRP agencies and partners.

The basic research supported and conducted by the National

Science Foundation (NSF) and the U.S. Geological Survey

(USGS) extends across a number of earthquake-related

1

Executive Summary

1 Beginning in FY 2005, NIST, which has become the lead agency for the

NEHRP, will be responsible for submitting an annual report to the

Congress on NEHRP activities, as required by the Earthquake Hazards

Reduction Authorization Act of 2004, Public Law 108-360, enacted on

October 25, 2004.

Nevada State Mapping Advisory Committee (NBMG) utilized HAZUS to produced an earthquake scenario for the Death Valley Region and worked with FEMA

HAZUS to update the Nevada portion of the earthquake fault database that is part of HAZUS.
disciplines, including earthquake engineering, seismology,

geology, and the social sciences.The knowledge gained by

basic research is used by the National Institute of Standards

and Technology (NIST) to help industry adopt and use

innovative technologies through problem-focused research

and development. FEMA synthesizes NIST and USGS applied

research results into useable loss-reduction tools and

methods, and uses research results to guide policy and

practice into seismic risk reduction.

During this reporting period, the NEHRP celebrated its 25th

anniversary. Some of the achievements of the NEHRP over the

last 25 years, such as the survival of the Trans-Alaska oil

pipeline during the 2002 Denali earthquake, are based on

earth science and earthquake engineering research. Mitigation

and outreach efforts have resulted in safer homes, schools,

and businesses in communities such as Los Angeles and

Seattle. All of the accomplishments share common features:

science and engineering drive the effort, partnerships are

established to achieve results, and the public benefits from the

synergy.Two notable domestic earthquakes that occurred

during this reporting period illustrate the benefits of the

NEHRP in reducing earthquake losses.

The magnitude 7.9 Denali earthquake rocked Alaska on

November 3, 2002.This was one of the largest recorded

earthquakes in our Nation’s history, causing countless

landslides and road closures, but minimal structural damage

and amazingly few injuries and no deaths. Although the

remote location of the earthquake helped ensure that it was

not more devastating, advanced seismic monitoring from the

USGS and NEHRP partners, long-term research, and a

commitment to earthquake preparedness and mitigation

played key roles.

The magnitude 6.5 San Simeon earthquake occurred on

December 22, 2003, with an epicenter near the Pacific coast

in central California.While it did not rupture the surface, the

earthquake triggered landslides and caused strong shaking.

The worst damage occurred in Paso Robles, 24 miles

southeast of the epicenter, where numerous older buildings

were damaged and one building collapsed, killing two people.

Significant liquefaction also damaged housing and buried

utilities in Oceano, nearly 50 miles away. In response to the

San Simeon earthquake, the USGS produced a ShakeMap

within 9 minutes of the event.The ShakeMap served as the

basis for loss estimation by the California Office of Emergency

Services using HAZUS, or Hazards U.S., within 1 hour.

One of the most successful risk assessment tools is HAZUS, a

cutting edge software program developed by FEMA with the

National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS). In the 7 years

since FEMA published the prototype earthquake edition

HAZUS97, HAZUS has helped communities across the United

States identify and plan for earthquakes by giving them

access, free of charge, to specialized databases and GIS-based

analytic tools. HAZUS-MH (HAZUS Multihazard) for

earthquakes streamlines modeling by merging up-to-date

natural hazards engineering and science with a powerful

geographic information system. Users can estimate damage

and other earthquake effects and then map, display, and

manage the results.With the completion of HAZUS-MH in

February 2004, FEMA has improved seismic hazard

identification and risk assessment methods with the

implementation of the fifth version of its nationally applicable

earthquake hazard model.

During this reporting period, the NIST continued to conduct

problem-focused research and development designed to

improve building codes, standards, and practices. In 2003,

NIST, in cooperation with the Applied Technology Council

(ATC), completed and published an action plan,The Missing

Piece: Improving Seismic Design and Construction Practices (ATC-57).The

action plan identifies industry priorities in two areas: (1)

support of the seismic code development process through

technical assistance and development of the technical basis for

performance standards; and (2) improved seismic design

productivity through the development of tools for the

evaluation of advanced technologies and practices. NIST is

now looking forward to working with the stakeholder

community to explore ways to best meet those needs via a

public-private partnership. NIST also expects that this effort

will build on NSF-funded basic research, including research

conducted as part of the George E. Brown, Jr. Network for

Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES).

The George E. Brown, Jr. NEES project was initiated by NSF

and the earthquake engineering community in response to a

congressional mandate (NEHRP Reauthorization Act of 1994)

to take stock of the Nation’s experimental and testing

capabilities in earthquake engineering. NEES will operate from

October 1, 2004, through September 30, 2014, and will be

managed by the nonprofit NEES Consortium, Inc., which will

allocate research time at equipment sites; lead training,

education, and outreach activities; and establish ties with U.S.

and international partners.The NEES will upgrade, modernize,

expand, and network major facilities, including:

• Shake tables used for earthquake simulations

• Geotechnical centrifuges for testing soils and foundations

under earthquake loading

• Tsunami wave basin for earthquake simulations

• Large-scale experimentation systems, e.g., reaction wall

and modular simulation equipment

• Field monitoring and testing facilities

2
NEES will lead to a new era of collaboration in earthquake

engineering research.Teams of experts in the United States

and around the world will have the unprecedented

opportunity to jointly plan, conduct, and analyze the results

of experiments and models. Easy access to the Network’s

resources will facilitate broad participation, both informally

and through official partnerships, by many communities of

users, including researchers, educators, students, engineers,

government agencies, professional organizations, industry, and

disaster preparedness and response teams. NEES ushers in a

new generation of earthquake engineering research. Enhanced

understanding of earthquakes and seismic performance made

possible by the Network’s people, ideas, and tools will lead to

innovative, cost-effective measures for better protecting the

vast network of facilities and services on which everyone

depends.

From these accomplishments and others described in this

report, it is apparent that the NEHRP agencies and their

partners have made a significant impact on the Nation’s

earthquake loss-reduction activities in FY 2003 and 2004.

Although there are challenges ahead for everyone in the

disaster community, the NEHRP is well positioned to both

continue as a strong, self-sustaining program and successfully

evolve as a key component of the new national infrastructure

protection scheme.This report highlights a cross-section of

achievements from the NEHRP agencies and their partners

that illustrate just some of the many benefits the NEHRP has

brought to the public during the past 2 years. By building on

these and other achievements, the future holds great promise

for protecting our country from earthquakes and other

hazards.

3
The National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program

Earthquakes represent the largest single potential source for

casualties and damage from a natural hazard in the United

States. Although damaging earthquakes occur infrequently,

they strike without warning, resulting in catastrophic

consequences.The 1994 Northridge, California earthquake,

for example, resulted in over 60 deaths, more than 5,000

injuries, and over 25,000 people left homeless. Direct

economic losses from the Northridge earthquake are

estimated at over $20 billion.

The Northridge earthquake, however, was not even a great

earthquake. It was a large (magnitude 6.7) earthquake of

relatively short duration (the main shock lasting roughly 15

seconds) that occurred along the fringe of a major

metropolitan area and struck during off-hours when impact

was reduced. By contrast, the 1906 San Francisco earthquake

was estimated as a magnitude 8.3 event, lasting 45 seconds.

The largest recorded earthquake in the United States was a

magnitude 9.2 event, lasting 3 minutes, that struck Prince

William Sound, Alaska on Good Friday, March 28, 1964.

Large events such as these can be expected in the United

States, and they may not be confined solely to the West Coast

region.Two of the most severe earthquakes in U.S. history

occurred east of the Rockies: one in Charleston, South

Carolina, in 1886 and the other a series of three shocks

centered near New Madrid, Missouri, in 1811-12. Measuring

an estimated 7.5-7.7 (near magnitude measure), the largest of

the New Madrid earthquake series sent shock waves as far

west as the Rocky Mountains and as far east as Washington,

D.C. and Boston.

Although earthquakes cannot be prevented, their impact on

life and property can be managed to a large degree.To that

end, the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program

(NEHRP), which is authorized by the Earthquake Hazards

Reduction Act of 1977 (Public Law 95-124), as amended,

seeks to mitigate earthquake losses in the United States

through both basic and directed research and implementation

activities in the fields of earthquake science and engineering.

The NEHRP agencies are the Federal Emergency Management

Agency (FEMA), the National Institute of Standards and

Technology (NIST); the National Science Foundation (NSF);

and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS).These agencies work

together to: improve understanding, characterization, and

assessment of hazards and vulnerabilities; improve model

building codes and land use practices; reduce risks through

post-earthquake investigations and education; improve design

4

I. Introduction

Northridge Earthquake, CA, January 17, 1994 — FEMA and local agencies provide a variety of emergency services to the disaster stricken area.Approximately

114,000 residential and commercial structures were damaged and 72 deaths were attributed to the earthquake. Damage costs were estimated at $25 billion.

(FEMA News Photo)
5

and construction techniques; improve the capacity of

government at all levels and of the private sector to reduce

and manage earthquake risk; and accelerate application of

research results.The role of each of the NEHRP agencies is

summarized below.

The NEHRP Agencies

Federal Emergency Management Agency

In Fiscal Year (FY) 2003 and 2004, FEMA had primary

responsibility for leading, planning, and coordinating the

overall NEHRP effort.The programmatic responsibilities of

FEMA include the following:

• Works closely with national standards and model

building code organizations, in conjunction with NIST, to

promote the implementation of research results

• Promotes better building practices within the building

design and construction industry, including architects,

engineers, contractors, builders, and inspectors

• Assists in the preparation and dissemination of seismic

resistant design guidance and related information on

building codes, standards, and practices for new and

existing buildings, structures, and lifelines, and the

development of performance-based design guidelines

• Provides grants and assistance to enable states to develop

mitigation, preparedness, and response plans, and

encourages the development of multi-state groups

• Supports state and local governments by providing multihazard loss estimation capability for use in planning and

response

• Translates research results into technical publications

National Institute of Standards and Technology

The NIST conducts problem-focused research and

development to improve building codes, standards, and

practices, including the following:

• Promotes better building practices among architects and

engineers

• Works with national standards organizations to develop

improved seismic standards for new and existing lifelines

• Chairs and provides the secretariat for the Interagency

Committee on Seismic Safety in Construction (ICSSC),

which recommends practices and policies to reduce

earthquake hazards in federally owned, leased, assisted,

and regulated facilities

National Science Foundation

The NSF funds research on earth sciences to improve the

understanding of the causes and behavior of earthquakes, on

earthquake engineering, and on human response to

earthquakes.The activities of the NSF include the following:

• Encourages prompt dissemination of significant findings,

sharing of data, samples, physical collections, and other

supporting materials, and development of intellectual

property so research results can be used by appropriate

organizations to mitigate earthquake damage

• Supports individual investigators and university research

consortia and centers for research in geosciences and in

earthquake engineering

• Works closely with the USGS to identify geographic

regions of national concern that should be the focus of

targeted solicitations for earthquake-related research

proposals

• Supports research that improves the safety and

performance of buildings, structures, and lifeline systems

using large-scale experimental and computational

facilities of the George E. Brown Jr. Network for

Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) and other

institutions engaged in research and the implementation

of the NEHRP

U.S. Geological Survey

The USGS conducts and supports earth science research that

increases knowledge about the origins and effects of

earthquakes, including the following:

• Develops national and regional seismic hazard maps

• Conducts engineering seismology studies of the groundshaking phenomenon

• Develops standardized procedures for predicting

earthquakes

The 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
• Supports an external cooperative grants research program

• Operates national seismograph networks

The NEHRP Partners

Many NEHRP accomplishments result from the coordination

and interaction among the four NEHRP agencies and with

public and private sector partners. For example, 28 federal

agencies and departments are members of the ICSSC, which

recommends uniform practices and policies to reduce

earthquake risk at federal facilities.The states, private sector,

universities, and regional, voluntary, and professional

organizations also contribute significantly to earthquake riskreduction efforts.

The multi-state regional organizations supported by the

NEHRP agencies are listed below.

• Cascadia Region Earthquake Workgroup (CREW)

• Central United States Earthquake Consortium (CUSEC)

• Northeast States Emergency Consortium (NESEC)

• Western States Seismic Policy Council (WSSPC)

There also are a number of organizations involved in

earthquake risk reduction activities that range from

engineering-based professional organizations, private sector

organizations, universities, and building code organizations to

organizations supported by one or more of the four NEHRP

agencies, such as the earthquake engineering centers (EERCs)

that were established by the NSF in 1997. Some of the

organizations supported by the NEHRP agencies are listed

below.

• Disasters Roundtable of the National Academies

• Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI)

• Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering

Research (MCEER)

• Mid-America Earthquake (MAE) Center

• Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research (PEER) Center

• Southern California Earthquake Center (SCEC)

• Natural Hazards Research and Applications Information

Center (NHRAIC)

Scope of This Report

This report responds to the congressional requirement to

report on the status of earthquake loss-reduction activities for

FY 2003 and 2004.The activities of the four NEHRP agencies,

federal agencies, state and local governments, and the private

sector, universities, and regional, voluntary, and professional

organizations listed above are described to illustrate the

nationwide scope of NEHRP’s impact.This report is organized

by the four NEHRP goals, which are the foundation upon

which NEHRP strives to reduce earthquake losses.

Goal A: Develop effective practices and policies for

earthquake loss reduction and accelerate their

implementation. This goal addresses the spectrum of

activities that result directly and indirectly in the reduction of

earthquake losses. Among these activities are: developing and

promoting incentives for mitigation action; facilitating seismic

building code adoption, implementation, and enforcement;

and providing technical assistance for developing and using

loss-reduction measures. Goal A activities are designed to

ensure that information about methods to reduce

vulnerability is provided to policymakers, building

professionals, and the public.

Goal B: Improve techniques to reduce seismic

vulnerability of facilities and systems. This goal includes

the development and distribution of tools to guide design and

construction practices as well as improvements in the use of

new technology, applied research, and problem-focused

studies.

Goal C: Improve seismic hazard identification and risk

assessment methods and their use. This goal addresses

the development and dissemination of products that

characterize earthquake-related hazards and vulnerability to

accurately measure seismic risk. Included are mapping of

ground motion, modeling earthquake effects based on the

maps, data collection (geophysical and structures inventory),

applying risk assessment modeling to local communities, and

operating earthquake information centers.

Goal D: Improve the understanding of earthquakes

and their effects. This goal supports research in the science

of earthquakes and associated hazards to advance earth

science, engineering, and social and economic knowledge.

Much of this research is accomplished through earthquake

monitoring, post-earthquake investigations, and experimental

earthquake engineering research facilities.

This report also includes a progress report on the seismic

safety of federal buildings that is required by Executive Orders

12699 and 12941.

6
The four National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program

(NEHRP) agencies work in close coordination to improve the

Nation’s understanding of earthquake hazards and to mitigate

their effects.The missions of the four agencies are

complementary.The Federal Emergency Management Agency

(FEMA), which is now a component of the U.S. Department

of Homeland Security (DHS), works with the states, local

governments, and the public to develop tools and improve

policies and practices that reduce earthquake losses.The

National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) enables

technology innovation in earthquake engineering by working

with industry to remove technical barriers, evaluate advanced

technologies, and develop the measurement and prediction

tools underpinning performance standards for buildings and

lifelines.The National Science Foundation (NSF) strives to

advance fundamental knowledge in earthquake engineering,

earth science processes, and societal preparedness and

response to earthquakes.The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)

monitors earthquakes, assesses seismic hazard for the Nation,

and researches the basic earth science processes controlling

earthquake occurrence and effects.

In March 2003, the NEHRP agencies submitted to the

Congress the Strategic Plan for the NEHRP for 2001-2005, Expanding

and Using Knowledge To Reduce Earthquake Losses (Strategic Plan).The

Strategic Plan serves as the operational plan for the NEHRP

agencies and guides federal earthquake research, loss

reduction, and mitigation efforts in the United States.The

Strategic Plan articulates the mission and the four primary

goals of the NEHRP, provides a framework for priority-setting

and coordinating activities, and defines priority areas for the

future.The activities of the NEHRP agencies and partners in

Fiscal Year (FY) 2003 and 2004 are described below under

the four primary goals of the NEHRP, as set forth in the

Strategic Plan.

NEHRP Accomplishments:

Goal A

Through Goal A of the Strategic Plan, the NEHRP seeks to

reduce the seismic vulnerability of the built and social

environment by disseminating earthquake hazard and risk

information and advocating risk reduction techniques.The

activities identified under Goal A are designed to accelerate

earthquake loss reduction in the public and private sector by

engaging and supporting partners at the local, state, and

national levels.

7

FEMA’s NEHRP web site home page (www.fema.gov/hazards/earthquakes/nehrp).

II.Achieving the Goals of the NEHRP
Goal A: Develop effective practices and policies for

earthquake loss reduction and accelerate their

implementation

1: Develop and provide information on earthquake hazards

and loss-reduction measures to decision-makers and the

public.

2: Promote incentives for public and private sector lossreduction actions.

3: Advocate state and local government practices and

policies that reduce losses in the private sectors.

4: Implement policies and practices that reduce vulnerability

of federal facilities.

5: Develop the Nation’s human resource base in the

earthquake field.

The NEHRP Agencies

Federal Emergency Management Agency

As the lead agency for the NEHRP in FY 2003 and 2004,

FEMA had primary responsibility for planning and

coordinating the Program, including leadership of the NEHRP

Interagency Coordinating Committee (ICC); strategic

planning for the NEHRP; organizing and implementing

forums, such as conferences and workshops for stakeholders

in the earthquake community; implementing interagency

agreements with agencies involved in seismic safety activities;

and public outreach and awareness.

The ICC, which was chaired by FEMA in FY 2003 and 2004,

met on a quarterly basis to discuss the interagency

coordination of projects, programs, plans, budgets, and

operational NEHRP issues.The periodic meetings of the ICC

provided the forum for discussing common activities,

exploring crosscutting issues, collaborating on joint projects,

identifying and resolving conflicts, and seeking interagency

support and cooperation. As needed, Subcommittees were

established by the ICC for specific projects, such as the

establishment of performance measures for the NEHRP.

The Strategic Plan discusses the need to develop a

performance plan for the NEHRP, including the development

of performance indicators or measures. For many public

sector organizations, implementing performance

measurement practices is a challenge because of the difficulty

inherent in measuring outcomes.The NEHRP faces this

challenge because earthquakes occur infrequently and it is

difficult to directly measure how earthquake mitigation

activities contribute to dollar losses avoided and a reduction

in casualties. An additional challenge to establishing

performance measures for the NEHRP is the different

missions, goals, and budgets of the four NEHRP agencies.

In FY 2003, FEMA initiated a project to develop a

performance management plan that includes a refined set of

performance measures for the NEHRP and a framework for

tracking, managing, maintaining, and reporting on the

performance of the NEHRP.When completed, the

performance management plan will assist the NEHRP lead

agency with coordination and planning and will assist the

other three NEHRP agencies with their responsibilities by

enabling them to monitor, improve, and report on program

performance at the agency level.The project work to establish

performance measures for the NEHRP is being guided by the

ICC Subcommittee on Performance Measures, which was

established in FY 2004.The performance measures for the

NEHRP and the performance management plan will be

completed by September 2005.

The primary ongoing responsibilities of FEMA under the

NEHRP fall under Goal A and Goal C of the Strategic Plan.The

NEHRP is structured such that efforts culminate in the

generation of a large range of products that address

earthquake hazards, document the associated seismic risk, and

provide loss-reduction alternatives.These products, which are

generated under Goal A, are largely the outgrowth of activities

under Goals B through D of the Strategic Plan. Successful

mitigation requires that the products be understood,

distributed, accepted, and used, and that a broad base of

earthquake-aware individuals be developed and nurtured at all

levels. FEMA’s responsibility for implementing risk reduction

was carried out through activities to develop and distribute

earthquake mitigation tools and products so that they can be

used effectively.Web sites, publications, press releases, and

conferences were some of the means of marketing earthquake

mitigation.

In FY 2004, FEMA began work on a publications marketing,

outreach, and distribution strategy for the NEHRP.The

purpose of the project is to evaluate available information on

NEHRP publications and outreach efforts and to identify

marketing and further implementation concepts.The

marketing strategy, which incorporates a market analysis,

audience analysis, evaluation of product quality and

distribution, and a strategic market plan, will assist FEMA and

the NEHRP agencies to effectively allocate resources to

increase the usefulness of NEHRP publications and tools to a

wider audience.The marketing strategy also is designed to

improve communication and distribution activities to meet

the overall NERHP goal of managing the impacts of

earthquakes so that loss of life and property are reduced.

In FY 2004, FEMA designed a new web page for the NEHRP

that includes sections designed to inform the public and

private sector of ongoing activities in earthquake mitigation

8
by all of the NEHRP agencies and partners.The new web site

(www.fema.gov/hazards/earthquakes/nehrp) includes:

general information on earthquakes and the NEHRP; NEHRP

success stories and community and homeowner success

stories; news and events, including press releases and articles

and information on upcoming meetings and conferences;

FEMA for Kids; links to related earthquake sites; a directory of

state earthquake resources; information on Hazards U.S.

(HAZUS), the FEMA Geographic Information System (GIS)-

based loss estimation software tool; seismic safety for

buildings; and frequently asked questions. FEMA also is in the

process of making NEHRP technical and non-technical

publications accessible in PDF format and text versions on the

web site.To facilitate this process, FEMA held a focus group at

this year’s National Earthquake Conference to gather feedback

from a representative cross-sample of participants on the best

way to present the publications online.

During this reporting period, FEMA also developed the

NEHRP Earthquake Coordinators web site

(www.training.fema.gov/emiweb/EarthQuake/

welcome.htm).This web site provides state and federal

NEHRP Earthquake Coordinators with a training course on

earthquake basics, hazards, risks, building science, advocacy

and partnerships, and priorities and successful activities.

FEMA also produced numerous products in FY 2003 and

2004 in support of the mission and goals of the Strategic

Plan. Among these products are: brochures that highlight the

achievements of the NEHRP agencies and partners and

brochures that focus on a specific mitigation area, such as

retrofit options for homeowners; exhibits for earthquake

conferences; PowerPoint presentations for FEMA Mitigation

Division staff and other organizations on the activities of the

NEHRP; and press releases.

In 2003, FEMA coordinated the activities in celebration of the

25th anniversary of the NEHRP and produced a brochure on

the achievements and initiatives of the four NEHRP agencies

over the past 25 years that have contributed to making our

communities and citizens safer from the effects of

earthquakes.The brochure includes a cross-section of selected

success stories from the NEHRP agencies that illustrate just

some of the many benefits that the NEHRP has brought to the

public since its inception.The brochure was distributed at an

event commemorating the anniversary at the National

Academy of Sciences (NAS) in March 2003.

The National Earthquake Conference, which was funded

jointly by FEMA and the USGS, was held in St. Louis,

Missouri, on September 26-30, 2004.The four regional

earthquake consortia hosted the Conference, which was

unique in bringing together the private sector, utilities, nonprofit organizations, academics, and as well as scientists,

emergency managers, and transportation officials from all

levels of government.The discussions were informative and

forthright, and sessions provided the private sector and others

with examples of success stories in earthquake mitigation that

they could take back to their organizations.

In FY 2003, FEMA administered NEHRP’s contribution of

Emergency Management Performance Grant (EMPG) funds to

the State Offices of Emergency Services. (In FY 2004, the

administration of the EMPG funds was transferred to the DHS

Office of Disaster Preparedness.) The EMPG funding was in

addition to the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP),

which is separate funding after a presidential disaster

declaration. NEHRP-related activities conducted by the states

with EMPG funds and HMGP funds are described below

under the appropriate NEHRP goals.

9

FEMA’s NEHRP Earthquake Coordinators web site (www.training.fema.gov/emiweb/EarthQuake/welcome.htm).
The Multihazard Mitigation Council (MMC) of the National

Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) has been responsible for

organizing and conducting the Multihazard Building Design

Summer Institute (MBDSI) at FEMA’s Emergency Management

Institute (EMI) since late 2000.Two sets of 1-week courses

were offered to college and university undergraduate

structural engineering professors. In 2003 and 2004, a course

entitled “Topics in Performance-Based Earthquake

Engineering” was offered. A more basic earthquake-resistant

design course based on the NEHRP Recommended Provisions for

Seismic Regulations for New Building and Other Structures was offered in

earlier years.

In FY 2003 and 2004, the FEMA Regions continued to

support the implementation of effective practices and policies

for earthquake loss reduction through support to state

earthquake and mitigation programs, promoting the use of

HAZUS and NEHRP publications through outreach to various

audiences, including professional organizations, emergency

managers, and businesses.The FEMA Regions also encouraged

mitigation, earthquake awareness and preparedness, and the

development of better response and recovery capabilities

through exercises. FEMA staff provided support to the

earthquake safety exercises of the Central United States

Earthquake Consortium (CUSEC) and to the Fifth Army using

New Madrid earthquake scenarios in 2003 and 2004, and in

Kansas to the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE)

Tuttle Creek Dam Safety Exercise 2004 that used an

earthquake on the Nemaha Fault.

National Institute of Standards and Technology

NIST chairs and provides the Technical Secretariat for the

Interagency Committee on Seismic Safety in Construction

(ICSSC).The ICSSC is composed of representatives of 32

federal agencies and acts as an advisory body to FEMA and

other government agencies on issues of seismic safety.The

ICSSC provides consistent standards for seismic safety of

federal buildings and establishes consistent guidance on

evaluation and mitigation of seismic risks in existing

buildings.The ICSSC helps to establish federal agency

leadership in ensuring the seismic safety of buildings and

lifeline systems. Recent accomplishments of the ICSSC are

described below.

• A comparison of the current model building codes (2003

International Building Code (IBC), 2003 International

Residential Code (IRC), and 2003 National Fire

Protection Association (NFPA) 5000) and American

Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) 7-02 to the 2000

NEHRP Recommended Provisions has been completed.

The ICSSC will issue guidance on the use of these codes,

based on the findings of the code comparison, to the

federal agencies in early 2005.

• ICSSC Subcommittee 2 has developed and implemented a

process for development of guidance to federal agencies

on seismic safety of lifeline systems. Using this process,

Subcommittee 2 has completed a draft report on seismic

safety of electric power production and distribution

systems.The draft report documents guidance currently

used by federal agencies with the responsibility for the

construction and operation of such systems, gaps where

research is needed to develop guidance for evaluation,

and recommendations for use by federal agency owner

operators to evaluate and mitigate seismic risks in these

systems.The final report, following approval of the ICSSC,

will be published in 2005. Subcommittee 2 is planning

to undertake a similar effort for water and wastewater

systems following completion of the report on electric

power production and distribution systems.

• In cooperation with ICSSC member agencies, NIST is

carrying out a project to develop a handbook for seismic

rehabilitation of existing buildings. NIST has established a

searchable database of relevant research conducted since

1990 and has used the database to identify rehabilitation

techniques for inclusion in the handbook.The handbook

will address 17 standard building types and foundations

and is consistent with the Standard for Evaluation of Seismic Risks

in Existing Buildings (ASCE 31) and the Prestandard for the Seismic

Rehabilitation of Buildings (FEMA 356).The handbook also

will be consistent with current FEMA publications on

seismic evaluation of existing buildings (FEMA 310) and

seismic rehabilitation of existing buildings (FEMA 356),

and will provide practical guidance on the application of

available and proven rehabilitation techniques and

associated impacts, i.e., relocation of occupants and

disruption of business.The handbook will be published

in 2005.

National Science Foundation

The Directorate for Engineering at NSF works with its

grantees to provide local outreach programs designed to

educate the public, promote earthquake awareness, and

develop strategies to transfer research findings into

implementation. NSF also supports outreach and information

dissemination through symposia and through grants to

organizations such as the Natural Hazards Research and

Applications Information Center (NHRAIC) and the

Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI) and its

Learning From Earthquakes program.

In the reauthorization legislation of the NEHRP in 1994,

Congress instructed the President to conduct a needs

assessment of earthquake engineering experimental research

facilities in the United States. NSF and NIST funded the

assessment, which was completed by EERI and resulted in a

report published in 1995, Assessment of Earthquake Engineering

10
Research and Testing Capabilities in the United States.The report makes

recommendations for improving the capacity of U.S. academic

research institutions to continue to carry out world-class

earthquake engineering experimental research, and notes that

“as the highest priority, existing laboratories must be

upgraded and modernized with new testing equipment.”

Over the years, NSF has continued to provide significant

funding for establishing and modernizing earthquake

engineering research facilities in the United States.Today, NSF

supports the following research centers and organizations:

• Mid-America Earthquake (MAE) Center at the University

of Illinois- Urbana-Champaign

• Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering

Research (MCEER) at SUNY Buffalo

• Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research (PEER) Center at

the University of California-Berkeley

• Southern California Earthquake Center (SCEC)

• Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS)

In FY 2000, NSF started construction of the George E. Brown,

Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES), a

comprehensive and networked system of earthquake

engineering test facilities.The NEES project, which was

completed at the end of FY 2004, is described under Goal D.

U.S. Geological Survey

The USGS Earthquake Hazards Program is the applied Earth

science component of NEHRP.The three basic elements of the

USGS Earthquake Hazards Program are assessment and

characterization of earthquake hazards; monitoring and

reporting earthquake activity and crustal deformation; and

conducting research into earthquake causes and effects.

The USGS contributes to earthquake hazard mitigation

strategies by estimating and describing the likelihood and

potential effects of moderate-to-large earthquakes in high-risk

regions of the United States and by transferring this

knowledge to individuals, organizations, and agencies that can

reduce the impact of potentially damaging earthquakes.

Federal, state, and local government agencies; architects and

engineers; insurance companies and other private businesses;

land-use planners; emergency response officials; and the

public rely on the USGS for earthquake hazard information to

refine building codes, develop land use strategies, safeguard

lifelines and critical facilities, develop emergency response

plans, and take other precautionary actions to reduce losses

from future earthquakes.

To answer the growing concern over the implications of the

Northridge earthquake and other recent seismic events in

southern California, the USGS and SCEC developed in 1995

Putting Down Roots in Earthquake Country, a graphically illustrated,

32-page color handbook on earthquake science, mitigation,

and preparedness. A new version of Roots, updated by SCEC

and USGS in 2004, features current scientific understanding

of when and where earthquakes will occur in Southern

California, and how the ground will shake as a result.

Updated maps of earthquakes, faults, and potential shaking

are included, as well as instructions on how to get

information after earthquakes.The preparedness section has

been completely reworked and is now organized according to

the “Seven Steps on the Road to Earthquake Safety.”These

steps provide a simple set of guidelines for preparing and

protecting lives and property and for surviving and

recovering from a damaging earthquake. In January 2004,

200,000 copies were printed with funding from the

California Earthquake Authority (CEA) and FEMA; an

additional 150,000 copies were printed in September 2004,

with funding from the CEA, USGS, Edison, Amgen,

Quakehold, and others. Copies of the document are

distributed at home improvement centers, via the American

Red Cross, and by many other means.The updated handbook

is available at http://www.earthquakecountry.info/ and a

Northern California version is in development. Both versions 

11

USGS’s Putting Down Roots in Earthquake Country handbook cover.
will also be translated into Spanish and versions for other

regions may be created.

Regional Consortia

A number of regional organizations have been established to

reduce earthquake risk and loss among their populations.

These regional organizations work in close cooperation with

the NEHRP agencies and other partners.

Cascadia Region Earthquake Workgroup

The Cascadia Region Earthquake Workgroup (CREW) is a

non-profit coalition of private and public representatives

working together to increase the ability of Cascadia Region

communities in the Pacific Northwest to reduce the effects of

earthquake events. CREW, which was established in 1996 by

the scientific community, promotes efforts to reduce the loss

of life and property; conducts education to motivate key

decision-makers to reduce risks associated with earthquakes;

and fosters productive linkages among scientists, critical

infrastructure providers, businesses, and governmental

agencies to improve the viability of communities after

earthquakes.

In February and March 2004, CREW held special purpose

forums for the Oregon land use planning community.

Programs were delivered by the University of Oregon Hazards

Center and the University of Washington’s Institute for

Hazards Mitigation. Each half-day forum presented current

seismic information and focused on the specific needs of land

use planners. A “snow card” approach was used and a paper

was presented to CREW and at the annual American Planners

Association Conference.

The CREW Business Survival Kit for Earthquakes and Other Disasters

video includes a CD containing the Institute for Business and

Home Safety (IBHS) tool kit.This product will be enhanced

with a revised tool kit being developed by the Seattle Disaster

Resistant Business Project. CREW is helping edit the

document and structuring it as an interactive web-based tool.

The kit was distributed at the National Earthquake Conference

in St. Louis, Missouri.

Evaluations of the National Earthquake Conference indicated

that the event was a resounding success, and CREW deserves

much credit. CREW was a sponsor of the National Earthquake

Conference and its executive director was one of the four

conference chairs. In support of the conference, CREW

identified speakers, oversaw the preparation of a conference

video, marketed the event, and participated on the steering

and subject area committees.

CREW conducted preparatory work for a workshop on April

5, 2004, involving 13 representatives of key area businesses,

with the purpose of identifying economic sector impacts to a

6.7 Seattle Fault earthquake.The workshop was conducted by

the University of Washington Institute for Hazards Mitigation.

Other CREW activities during the reporting period include:

• Participated in bi-monthly planning meetings of the

Partners In Emergency Preparedness conference steering

committee, staffed a booth at the conference, and

provided presenters.

• Participated in activities of the Contingency Planning and

Recovery Managers (CPARM), the Snohomish Business

Recovery Managers, and the Association of Contingency

Planners (ACP).

• Actively supported the Seattle Disaster Resistant and

Business Emergency Network initiatives

• Supported the activities of the Pacific Northwest

Economic Region and its scheduled “Blue Cascadia

Exercise”

• Provided continuing support to the Western States Seismic

Policy Council (WSSPC) and Emergency Management

Council

CREW, in partnership with the Oregon Department of

Geology and Mineral Industry (DOGAMI), printed 500

copies of Cascadia Earthquakes – A Clear and Present Danger and

distributed copies at the National Earthquake Conference.The

final document will be available for distribution by February

2005.

Central United States Earthquake Consortium

The efforts of CUSEC are built on an all-hazards emergency

management approach that centers on preparedness,

mitigation, multi-state planning (response and recovery), and

research. CUSEC was formed as, and continues to be, a

partnership of the Federal Government (primarily FEMA) and

the eight member states it represents: Alabama, Arkansas,

Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, and

Tennessee. CUSEC also represents 10 associate states: Georgia,

Iowa, Louisiana, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma,

South Carolina, and Virginia. Earthquakes occurring in the

New Madrid Seismic Zone (NMSZ) and in other nearby fault

zones can significantly affect these states. CUSEC serves as an

integral link in helping its member states bridge the gaps in

addressing the seismic hazard between local and state needs

and their federal counterparts.This link, and the regional

approach to addressing a single hazard shared by multiple

states, is one of the four goals of the NEHRP.

12
CUSEC activities included assistance in the development of

outreach programs, such as earthquake awareness week, to

the states of Missouri, Mississippi,Tennessee, and Arkansas.

CUSEC, along with the emergency management agencies of

Arkansas, Mississippi, and Tennessee, co-sponsored the second

annual Tri–State Earthquake conference, which promotes

unity of the earthquake program by allowing these

neighboring states to combine their efforts.The benefit is

greater exposure to the issues and a more cost effective

approach than three separate efforts.

During this period, CUSEC continued to expand the concept

of regional working groups as a method of bringing focused

expertise on the earthquake risk. A key group has included

state Public Information Officers, whose expertise in public

awareness has resulted in the development of materials such

as the Central U.S. Earthquake Hazard Media Guide, as well as

standardization of press releases used by the CUSEC states,

ensuring the release of accurate and concise information to

the media and the public.

Technology has enhanced the methods for delivering

information.The CUSEC web page added a considerable

amount of new information during this period. Information

included posting of the NEHRP Strategic Plan; information

specific to the working groups; new publications; seismic

mapping resources; an update of the original Six Cities Study 

using FEMA’s state-of-the-art HAZUS software; and new links

to informational earthquake sites.The web page also provided

background on the programs of the CUSEC member states so

that visitors could gain a better understanding of how each

state addressed the seismic risk and how that relates to the

overall regional approach to reducing the risk.

In an effort to determine that earthquake-related educational

materials were available for K-3, materials from across the

United States were collected and compiled into a database

distributed among the CUSEC states.The database serves three

purposes: (1) it gives the earthquake program managers of

the CUSEC states an idea of the materials available to them;

(2) it helps to determine if any gaps exist in the types of

materials available; if gaps are determined, these will be

considered as future projects; and (3) it helps to identify any

duplication that exists so that limited funds that can be used

for other purposes.

The coordination of earthquake planning efforts has been a

CUSEC priority since the organization’s inception in 1983.

The regional impact of a major earthquake in the central

United States, coupled with complex operational and logistic

problems associated with emergency response, underscores

the need for a multi-state approach to planning. One of the

key multi-state/regional issues that continue to be a priority

is coordination among the CUSEC states to address the

priorities of one state in relation to its neighboring states.This

is an essential process not only for the immediate response

needs following an earthquake or other large-scale disaster,

but also for economic recovery. An Operations subcommittee

was formed to work with the CUSEC Transportation Task

Force in addressing key issues raised during this period, such

as the establishment of a uniform definition of a priority

route.

The strength of CUSEC has been and continues to be built

around the partnership approach to addressing the seismic

hazard.This partnership, although predominately between

public sector organizations, has continued to reach out to the

private sector. International Paper Corporation and Simpson

Strong Tie, Inc. both became corporate sponsors during this

period.Their inclusion in CUSEC’s efforts has not only

broadened the planning perspective, it also provides the

opportunity to gain a better understanding of the emergency

preparedness issues important to the private sector.

Training also remained an essential part of CUSEC’s efforts.To

regionalize the training offered and to build uniformity,

CUSEC has encouraged the adoption of the Missouri

Structural Assessment Visual Evaluation (SAVE) Coalition as a

model for all CUSEC states in the development of their

programs. By adopting a program with a similar structure,

each state would be assured of a program with a level of

accountability.Years of training have yielded numerous

13

Estimated ShakeMap for the 1812 New Madrid earthquake.
14

inspectors, but lack of structure in the program in many cases

has made it difficult to manage.

A regionalized approach to training was also adopted during

this period to stretch available funding.The Postearthquake

Safety Evaluation of Buildings (ATC-20) workshops were

offered as a collaborative effort. CUSEC provided the basic

funding and workshop coordination while the states of

Arkansas and Missouri provided the instructors and arranged

for the workshop sites. As a contribution to the training

effort, each site was provided free of charge.The Arkansas

Electric Cooperative and the Missouri Department of

Conservation-Discovery Center in Kansas City were both

excellent facilities to host the workshop.

To complement state and local mitigation efforts in support of

the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000, and to improve

techniques to reduce seismic vulnerability of facilities and

systems, training workshops on the Rapid Visual Screening of

Buildings for Potential Seismic Hazards were conducted. Used

extensively during the 1980s and early 1990s, these

workshops provided the training needed by the communities

of today to evaluate the structures in their community to

determine the level of vulnerability.

During this reporting period, the CUSEC State Transportation

Task Force analyzed the need for a regionalized approach to

bridge inspection. Using a program developed at Purdue

University for the Indiana Department of Transportation

(DOT), the CUSEC states are looking at methods to assess the

viability of a regional approach.

One of the most effective ways to improve the odds of

reducing or eliminating vulnerability is to expose individuals

and groups to exemplary efforts undertaken by others in

reducing their vulnerability. CUSEC sponsored a field trip to a

recently completed project in Tuckerman, Arkansas.

Representatives from state departments of education, local

emergency management, and universities received first-hand

information on a school mitigation project that turned the

elementary school’s main hallway into a safe room.The

project, which was completed under budget and during

summer recess, was viewed by field trip participants as a

viable project that could be implemented in their

communities.

Northeast States Emergency Consortium

The Northeast States Emergency Consortium (NESEC)

develops, promotes, and coordinates natural disaster and

emergency management activities throughout the Northeast.

This includes natural hazard evaluation and assessment, public

awareness and education programs, hazard mitigation, and

information technology transfer. Connecticut, Maine,

Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode

Island, and Vermont form the NESEC.

During this reporting period, the Executive Director of NESEC

served as Chairman of the Organizing Committee for the

National Earthquake Conference in Saint Louis.The effort to

organize this conference, which was hosted by the four

regional earthquake consortia, spanned a period of 2 years.

The conference was attended by more than 300 participants

and from all accounts was a tremendous success.The private

sector was well represented at the conference, comprising

approximately 30 percent of the attendees.The lead agencies

and conference organizers are developing a conference report

with recommendations for future follow-up actions and

activities.

Western States Seismic Policy Council

The WSSPC is a regional earthquake consortium formed as a

private not-for-profit corporation.WSSPC draws its

membership from the emergency managers and geoscientist

directors of 13 western states, 3 territories, a Canadian

territory, and a Canadian province.The mission of the WSSPC

is to help reduce future earthquake losses by providing a

forum to advance earthquake programs throughout the

Western Region and by developing and facilitating the

implementation of seismic policies and programs through

information exchange, research application, and education.

WSSPC provides a broad regional and multidisciplinary forum

to enhance and create partnership opportunities for seismic

hazards mitigation and to fulfill its missions of developing

seismic policies and sharing information to promote

programs intended to reduce earthquake-related losses.

The Awards in Excellence program recognizes achievement in

different areas of earthquake mitigation, preparedness, and

response. Categories include mitigation, educational outreach,

research, response plans or materials, non-profit agency

efforts, seismic legislation, use of new technology, and

innovations.Winners are selected by the WSSPC Board of

Directors and the awards are featured on the WSSPC website

and in the Awards in Excellence volume. Eleven programs

from 7 western states won awards in 2003. In 2004, the

WSSPC Awards in Excellence program was used as a model

for the National Awards of Excellence given at the National

Earthquake Conference. A committee comprised of members

from numerous national organizations selected the 10

winners from across the country.

WSSPC members develop and adopt policy recommendations

that local, state, or federal agencies can implement.These

policy recommendations address a range of seismic risk,

monitoring, mitigation, and response issues, and provide

substantial credible support for earthquake program

improvements.The participation of WSSPC member

organizations in developing these policies, and rigorous

review of these recommendations by stakeholders throughout

the region, provide assurance that the recommendations are

appropriate and relevant to the particular jurisdiction.The
WSSPC policy committees provide a neutral forum for such

policy development by a credible group of experts.The

WSSPC adopted eight policy recommendations in 2003 and

2004.

Annual conferences provide a regional and national forum for

scientists, engineers, emergency managers, the business

community, policymakers, and other stakeholders to exchange

ideas and information. In 2003, the WSSPC-led conference

focused on Earthquake Loss Reduction and Developing

Effective Communication, Realistic Strategies and Successful

Mitigation Actions for Communities.

In 2004,WSSPC was the financial, logistical, and marketing

manager for the National Earthquake Conference, put on

primarily with FEMA, USGS, CREW, CUSEC, and NESEC, but

also including representatives from the private sector, nonprofit organizations, and state seismic safety and advisory

boards.The goal of the conference was to provide a forum for

discussion of national earthquake issues and generate ideas for

future collaborative actions to be taken to reduce earthquake

risk in the United States. One of the outcomes was the

production of a 27-minute video “Living with Risk,”

intended as an educational tool for a general audience.

WSSPC, USGS, and FEMA, along with western states

geological surveys, sponsored the second Basin and Range

Province Seismic Hazards Summit to bring together

geoscientists, engineers, emergency managers, and

policymakers to discuss the latest earthquake hazards research

and to evaluate its implications for hazard reduction and

public policy.The meeting highlighted technical issues

important to understanding earthquake hazards in the

extensional Basin and Range Province.

Selected State, Territorial, And Local Accomplishments

FEMA allocates a portion of its NEHRP funds to state

governments as part of the annual EMPG.With the grant

funds, state and local agencies undertake numerous activities

to protect their citizens from the earthquake hazard.

Highlights of some of the many successful state, territorial,

and local government efforts in support of Goal A are

described below.

Alaska

The Alaska Denali Fault 7.9 earthquake spurred great interest

in Alaska’s earthquake hazard. Subsequent to the earthquake,

there was a surge of requests for non-structural seismic

hazard mitigation demonstrations for the Division’s outreach

tools, including the Quake Cottage earthquake simulator and the

Earthquake Resistant Model Home.These tools provide audiences

with effective earthquake preparedness and mitigation lessons

as well as build visual relationships to the effects of hazards

affecting structures. Over 11,500 people attended these

presentations at 23 public and private schools, at safety events

with major petroleum corporations, health institutions,

government agencies, and State Fairs. The Division also

coordinated a multi-agency effort to update and reprint the

earthquake and tsunami preparedness booklet, Are You Prepared

for the Next Big Earthquake in Alaska. This was a major

undertaking; 250,000 copies were printed, with 130,000

copies of the booklet inserted into newspapers statewide

commemorating the 40th anniversary of the 1964 Great

Alaskan Earthquake.

Alaska’s tsunami partnership led to significant mitigation

program results. The group conducted remote community

assistance visits bringing Earthquake Preparedness,

TsunamiReady® and StormReady®,Tsunami Sign Program

Awareness, and Disaster Preparedness information to Chignik

and Perryville in the Aleutians and Craig, Klawock,Thorne Bay

and Hydaburg, located along the Southeast Alaska panhandle.

The City of Kodiak, Alaska became Alaska’s fifth

TsunamiReady® community in February 2004, furthering

preparedness initiatives for Alaska’s population and its visitors.

The State of Alaska’s Division of Homeland Security and

Emergency Management (DHS&EM) combines its mitigation,

earthquake, tsunami, and preparedness programs to ensure

the public is educated about the natural hazard threats.

15

Are You Prepared for the Next Big Earthquake in Alaska booklet cover.
DHS&EM takes great pride in its partnerships with the

University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute

(UAF/GI), Alaska Department of Natural Resources Division

of Geological and Geophysical Survey, Alaska Earthquake

Information Center, Alaska Department of Transportation and

Public Facilities,West Coast/Alaska Tsunami Warning Center,

National Weather Service (NWS), National Oceanic and

Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Pacific Marine

Environmental Laboratory and Tsunami Inundation Mapping

Effort (TIME), FEMA, the Department of Interior (DOI), and

Alaska’s boroughs, local, and tribal governments. Very few

projects would be accomplished without quality partnerships

and willing participation.

DHS&EM aggressively supports and funds the statewide use of

the Municipality of Anchorage’s Building Safety Officer to

manage and coordinate its Post Disaster Damage Assessment

(PDDA) training program. The PDDA Coordinator conducted

six Post Disaster Damage Assessment courses resulting in an

increase of 195 damage assessment evaluators between the

spring of 2003 and summer 2004. Refresher training was

also conducted for 47 students. These efforts allow for the

tracking of training while ensuring that trained individuals

can be contacted and deployed statewide during disasters to

support Search and Rescue operations with timely building

assessments. Sitka, Alaska is the first community to adopt a

section into their statutes concerning damage assessment and

allowing the use of volunteer evaluators from other areas.

The Tsunami Inundation Mapping project for Homer and

Seldovia, Alaska, sponsored by NOAA and State of Alaska, will

be published in late 2004. This project provides potential

tsunami mapping coverage to local community partners so

that they can tailor the information obtained from the

inundation maps toward effective planning efforts. These

maps will assist the communities prepare for and mitigate

against potential tsunamis. The Alaska Division of Geological

and Geophysical Survey produces the final maps for

distribution by the local government and emergency

management. Seward, Alaska is in the beginning stages of

this mapping effort and Sitka, Alaska has recently undergone

bathymetric (undersea) mapping by NOAA This information

is vital to completing inundation modeling and the

subsequent maps after the models are validated.

California

Staff of the California Office of Emergency Services (OES)

continued to serve on the Board of Directors of the Northern

California Chapter of the EERI; the Board of Directors of the

NIBS; the California Earthquake Safety foundation; as Chair of

the EERI Special Projects and Initiatives Committee

(Endowment); the Steering Committee for the 1st

International Conference on Urban Hazard Mitigation, to be

convened in Kobe in January 2005; and on the organizing

and coordinating Committee for the 100th Anniversary

Conference for the 1906 Earthquake, including the

Conference Steering Committee and the ’06 Alliance, which

serves to coordinate all 1906 anniversary activities in

northern California. In addition, staff serves on numerous

state and regional committees to coordinate earthquake

preparedness and response planning, including the California

Emergency Services Association and Mutual Aid Advisory

Committees.

The OES Director and his designate participate on the Board

of Directors of the WSSPC and participated in Board and

annual meeting activities, including planning for the National

Earthquake Conference held in St. Louis in 2004.The

California Integrated Seismic Network, as a Region of the

Advanced National Seismic System (ANSS) of the USGS, is

represented on a number of coordinating committees of

ANSS. Staff also participated on a NAS Panel on the economic

benefits of seismic networks in the U.S.

OES GIS staff developed and delivered statewide hazard maps

to each of the Operational Areas (counties), completing the

Statewide Hazard Atlas in support of local preparedness and

preparation of local plans as part of the Disaster Mitigation Act

of 2000 requirements. Atlases were provided in both hard

copy and digital formats for use by local planners.The maps

included probabilistic earthquake ground motions, historic

earthquake epicenters, liquefaction susceptibility (where

available), flood, and land slide. Maps were provided to

Operational Area emergency managers and land use planning

agencies.

Resource Centers in Southern and Coastal Region offices of

OES continue to provide information on preparedness,

mitigation, and response to the public, local governments,

and state agencies. Information is available for day care

centers, schools, for persons with disabilities, businesses, and

16

Tsunami inundation map for Eureka, CA.
the general public. Publications include sample emergency

plans, safety elements, mitigation programs, as well as graphic

and video materials for presentations to client groups. Hazard

mitigation materials address fire, flood, tsunami, landslides,

and terrorism, in addition to general earthquake

preparedness. Coastal Region staff continues to distribute

materials from PrepareNow.org targeted to special

populations, including the disabled, the elderly, and nonEnglish speakers.

OES continued the statewide distribution of School Districts Guide

for Nonstructural Earthquake Hazards in California Schools. The

document was also distributed at the National Earthquake

Conference and at WSSPC meetings, as well as being available

on the OES and NIBS websites.

California, along with other NEHRP states, was inundated

with inquires about Douglas Copp and the “triangle of life.”

The OES earthquake program coordinated with FEMA Region

IX and Region X staff, the American Red Cross, and

representatives from the other western states in drafting and

distributing and official response.The OES position is that

based on all available information from the structural

engineering and medical communities, the greatest benefit to

building occupants in California is provided by the current

Duck (Drop), Cover and Hold instruction.

The California Earthquake Prediction Evaluation Council

(CEPEC) met twice during this reporting period.The first

meeting reviewed several commercial proprietary earthquake

prediction services being marketed in the United States.The

second meeting was convened to review and respond to the

press releases related to ‘predictions’ made by Dr.Vladimir

Keilis-Borok of the University of California, Los Angeles.

CEPEC met in February 2004 with representatives of the

USGS to review Dr. Keilis-Borok’s methodology and previous

predictions. CEPEC concluded that the “uncertainty along

with the large geographic area included in the prediction

(about 12,400 square miles) leads (us) to conclude that the

results do not at this time warrant any special policy actions

in California.” CEPEC findings were provided to FEMA, USGS,

local governments, and the media.

OES staff participated on the Steering Committee of the

NOAA National Tsunami Hazard Mitigation Program

(NTHMP) and continued to support use of tsunami

inundation maps and public information materials developed

by the State and NTHMP to develop evacuation plans and

procedures by the coastal cities and counties. OES convened

two meetings of the State Tsunami Hazard Steering

Committee, comprised of representatives of the coastal

counties, to review program progress and set overall program

priorities.Two activities were initiated during this period.The

first was a Workshop of Tsunami Sources that will focus on

developing a probabilistic approach to mapping tsunami

inundation along the California Coast.The second activity is a

training workshop for coastal jurisdiction emergency

managers that will address developing evacuation plans,

coordinating public information with adjacent states, and use

of NOAA Alert Radio, Emergency Alert Systems, and siren

systems to alert coastal residents and visitors to an imminent

tsunami threat. OES also contracted with the University of

Southern California for the development of inundation maps.

Maps have been produced for all counties south of the San

Francisco Bay Region, and maps from the Bay to the Oregon

border will be completed this year.

Hawaii

The Hawaii State Civil Defense (SCD) Earthquake Program has

made notable accomplishments in earthquake loss reduction.

The SCD-sponsored Hawaii State Earthquake Advisory

Committee (HSEAC) has served as a catalyst to identify and

implement priorities in short- and long-range goals of

earthquake hazard reduction. HSEAC is composed of a

voluntary partnership of scientists, engineers, land use

planners, and emergency managers from the federal, state,

county, and private sectors.

HSEAC provided technical expertise to the high hazard

County of Hawaii to adopt the 2000 IBC.The seismic

provisions were written specifically for the island of Hawaii’s

unique volcanic geology. Moreover, HSEAC wrote seismic

structural specifications for the county’s simplified design

procedures ordinance. Both amendments have been well

received by the County of Hawaii Building Division and

included as part of the county’s proposed adoption of the

1997 Uniform Building Code (UBC) currently under

consideration.

HSEAC created and posted a Construction Guide on Strengthening

Existing Houses in Hawaii Against Hurricanes and Earthquakes on a state

hazard mitigation website.The construction guide provides

the public with information on how to retrofit unique Hawaii

constructed home types, which significantly differ from

continental United States home construction.The web site is

www.MotherNature-Hawaii.com.

Idaho

The Bureau of Disaster Services and the Idaho Geological

Survey have an active and ongoing partnership for assessing

and mitigating the state’s natural hazards.The partnership also

provides an annual field workshop for earth science

educators. In addition to supporting counties in promoting

earthquake awareness and loss-reduction techniques, a multiagency advisory committee provides input to the Survey’s

mapping activities, which provide input to the seismic

studies.

17
The annual field workshops for earth science educators

studied the geology and geologic hazards of the Clearwater

River area in west-central Idaho in 2003 and the Long Valley

area in western Idaho in 2004.Teachers use workshop

information to create curricula that combine science with

hazard awareness to engage students at various levels—from

mapping buildings using GIS and an abbreviated Rapid Visual

Screening inventory to identifying non-structural hazards in

their schools.

In 2004, the Bureau of Disaster Services funded workshops

on Postearthquake Safety Evaluation of Buildings (ATC-20).

The Bureau of Disaster Services also funded all-hazards

mitigation planning for 13 counties.

Activities of the Idaho earthquake hazard reduction program

include:

• Increased inquiries from insurance agencies, banks, and

citizens about location of active faults and local seismicity

• Increased opportunities for educators and building

officials in appropriate hazard mitigation techniques

• Increased interest in, and participation by, teachers in

earthquake education

• Increased adoption and updating of building codes—

important because Idaho is developing rapidly, so that an

up-to-date building code will have a positive impact on

the new building stock

• Increased interest in retrofit codes so that older buildings

are seismically stronger

• Increased response to annual surveys of public buildings

by the Idaho Division of Building Safety

Maine

The State of Maine has a staff person within the Maine

Emergency Management Agency who provided earthquakerelated support to various activities within the State, including

the following:

• Updated the seismic portion of the State Emergency

Operations Plan

• Provided Maine Department of Transportation personnel

in Bridge Design and in Road Construction divisions

with seismic mitigation information and with 

information about various EMI courses, including the

HAZUS courses

• Provided the University of Maine Engineering faculty

with information about various seismic-related courses,

including the MBDSI courses

• Provide schools with seismic-related educational materials

• Provided the Maine Department of Education unit that

reviews school construction plans with seismic mitigation

publications

• Participated in seismic notification for tests and actual

events

Missouri

The Missouri State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA)

Earthquake Program continues to promote earthquake lossreduction practices and policies by encouraging mitigation,

sponsoring earthquake awareness and preparedness programs,

and developing better response and recovery capabilities

through exercises.

SEMA made the initial request to CUSEC to hold an

earthquake exercise in 2007 for all of the states that would be

affected by an earthquake along the New Madrid Fault. SEMA

also continues to provide funding and support for the SAVE

Coalition to train and certify post-earthquake structural

inspectors in the Post-earthquake Safety Evaluation of

Buildings (ATC-20 training). SAVE now has over 1,200

volunteer member inspectors qualified to perform postearthquake structural inspections.

Each year, SEMA and the Missouri Seismic Safety Commission

hold a weeklong earthquake awareness campaign.The

campaign features: (1) a signed Governor’s Proclamation; (2)

the Missouri SEMA Public Information Officer e-mail posts to

the homepage, a media kit with press releases, and brochures

to 130 Emergency Management Directors and 185 media

venues in the 47 counties at risk; (3) seminars conducted in

St. Louis and other population centers; (4) earthquake display

at the Truman Building and Capitol in Jefferson City and St.

Louis Science Center; and (5) a hands-on event at the St.

Louis Science Center.

Montana

With fewer resources available to sustain efforts in Montana, it

has been necessary to become extremely creative with

finances and resources. As Montana is no longer able to send

out publications and other materials in mass quantities,

reliance on its web site for supplying information has become

a critical part of the State’s focus. The entire “Earthquake

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Preparedness Month” campaign is delivered online. Where

Montana once sent out thousands of fliers, bookmarks,

posters, press releases, and fact sheets, Montana now provides

that information via its web site. This approach has saved the

program money and is much more effective in reaching the

public. In this regard, fewer resources have contributed to a

better campaign effort.The program manager continues to

visit schools, businesses, and governmental agencies to

provide training on earthquake preparedness.

Nevada

Funding from NEHRP has been instrumental in reducing risks

from earthquakes in Nevada. Funds from NEHRP through

FEMA have been used to support the Nevada Earthquake

Safety Council, which advises the State Division of Emergency

Management on earthquake issues.The Council, with the help

of the Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology (the state

geological survey) and the Nevada Seismological Laboratory,

undertook several projects in public education, preparedness,

and mitigation. Minutes of quarterly meetings of the

Council, technical guidelines adopted by the Council, and

related documents are available on the Web

(http://www.nbmg.unr.edu/nesc/index.html).

A major accomplishment of the Council was the passage of

Nevada Assembly Bill 59. This bill, which was signed into

law by the Governor near the end of the 2003 biennial

session of the Nevada Legislature, requires adoption of the

seismic provisions of the IBC for state buildings and by local

jurisdictions, and requires adoption of standards for the

investigation of earthquake hazards relating to surface

ruptures and liquefaction.

Oregon

The Oregon Seismic Safety Policy Commission has convened a

task force to support the issuance of Government Obligation

Bonds to implement Senate Joint Resolutions 21 and 22 that

authorized the state to issue bonds to finance seismic retrofit

of public education buildings and emergency service

buildings.This task force is working closely with the State

Senate President for submission to the legislature.

The Oregon DOGAMI and Oregon Emergency Management

(OEM) have partnered to survey county emergency managers

on the seismic vulnerability of their emergency facilities.

Oregon University System is currently evaluating its campus

facilities for seismic vulnerability and prioritizing retrofit

projects.

In partnership with Oregon Natural Hazards Workgroup,

OEM promoted “drop, cover, and hold” earthquake and

tsunami drills and evacuations through Earthquake Awareness

activities and presentations.

Puerto Rico

As part of the Puerto Rico State Emergency Management

Agency (PRSEMA) role to save lives and properties in the

Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the following earthquake

activities were conducted:

• Creation, reproduction, and dissemination throughout

the 78 municipalities of educational pamphlets associated

with preparedness, response, mitigation, and recovery to

reduce the loss of life and property, in coordination with

the American Red Cross.

• Conduct of a Tsunami Workshop for Local and State

Emergency Managers.This workshop provides historical

tsunami data, possible earthquake, submarine landslide,

volcano activities, and explosions that could cause

tsunamis. Also included is information on equipment

availability, present and future activities to enhance

community awareness, and the establishment of

topographic and bathymetric data and photo collection

for the entire Caribbean zone.

• Creation, reproduction, and dissemination throughout

the 78 municipalities of an interactive CD for youths,

teens, and adults that provides graphics, maps, games,

and an informative pamphlet regarding preparedness,

response, recovery, terrorism, and mitigation.

• In coordination with the Puerto Rico Seismic Network,

conducted seven seismic and tsunami-related activities,

which include the establishment of a technical Seismic

Committee; seismic and tsunami-related workshops for

government officials; tsunami alert system data; a tsunami

drill scenario for schools located on the coast; update to

the Seismic Network website with PRSEMA’s data and

other emergency preparedness, response, recovery, and

mitigation information; and participation in the Annual

National Tsunami conference.

• Conducted 12 mitigation activities for “Special

Communities” for the entire family to promote positive

mental health during disasters.

• Conducted four workshops for State and Regional Hazard

Mitigation Team representatives on mitigation measures

and activities related to the State Mitigation Program,

including the Annual PRSEMA Conference held in May

2004.

• Conducted 20 site inspections of potential Emergency

Disaster Recovery Centers for certification and use in case

of an emergency of disaster.

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• Developed and adopted a Standard State Hazard

Mitigation Plan.

• Continued work with the International Code Council

(ICC) and the NFPA to develop and maintain disasterresistant building codes and work with communities to

promote local adoption of disaster resistant building

codes, in coordination with the Puerto Rico State Fire

Department.

• Developed guidance documents, multi-hazard training

courses, and other resources to improve risk assessments,

mitigation planning, and residential and commercial

construction practices for multi-hazard risk reduction.

• Actively coordinated with other federal departments and

agencies to identify ways to work together to support

national mitigation goals, and to keep and secure new

partnerships with business, non-profit, faith-based, and

public sector organizations at the national, state, and

community levels.

• Supported the development and use of seismic design

guidance for new construction and for upgrading

existing buildings and other structures in partnership

with regulatory agencies.

• Increased the number of Emergency Action Plans in

communities located below significant and high-hazardpotential dams.

Washington

Every year, April is designated “Disaster Preparedness Month.”

The theme of the campaign is “Prepare Because You Care.”

Local jurisdictions, state agencies, schools, businesses, and the

general public distribute materials. A statewide earthquake

“Drop, Cover and Hold” drill is conducted with over 1.5

million citizens participating.The campaign provides an

excellent opportunity to educate and increase awareness on

the seismic risk the public faces and how to mitigate it.

Achievements included two WSSPC National Awards in

Excellence in 2003 for overall excellence in mitigation and

educational outreach. In addition, five International

Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM) 2003 and three

IAEM 2004 Media Awards were received for earthquake

products produced for the campaign.

In conjunction with the Seismic Safety Committee (SSC),

Washington Emergency Management Division (EMD) and

Department of Natural Resources/Division of Geology and

Earth Resources fostered implementation of SSC Policy

Recommendations by developing a report for the Emergency

Management Council. One of the top recommendations was

the state adoption of the IBC, which was approved by the

2003 legislature and signed by the Governor on May 14,

2003.

EMD and the Institute of Geological and Nuclear Sciences in

New Zealand partnered to quantify the public and private

sectors’ understanding of earthquake and tsunami hazards on

the Washington coast, their knowledge of the Washington

State All Hazard Alert Broadcasting (AHAB) Radio and NOAA

Weather Radio notification systems, and their preparedness to

deal with earthquake and tsunami activity.To fix deficiencies

noted in the school assessments, EMD developed and

published a book for K-6, How the Smart Family Survived a Tsunami.

The book addresses the tsunami warning process, the

Washington’s AHAB Radio, and actions they should take when

a tsunami warning is received.The book also includes

information on a family disaster plan and disaster supply kit.

The book is now being used nationally by other tsunami atrisk states and has been given to the International Tsunami

Information Center for use by countries susceptible to

tsunamis. It provides a baseline for emergency managers in

developing risk communication, public education, and

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EMD’s How the Smart Family Survived a Tsunami book cover.
mitigation planning.The book won the 2004 National

Earthquake Conference Award of Excellence.

EMD partnered with the private sector to design and develop

the AHAB Radio System to provide both tone and voice alert

notification to at-risk communities for any hazardous

situation. It can be powered by wind, solar, or commercial

electricity.When used in concert with the NOAA Weather

Radio, it becomes a highly effective alert and notification

system. A pilot system was installed with a wind-generated

powered system on a beachhead in Ocean Shores,

Washington, in June 2003. Five electrical systems were

installed in 2004 for port security, volcano, and tsunami

warning.The system is presently being deployed in Alaska,

California, American Samoa, and Guam. Fiji,Tonga, and

Samoa are now interested in the system. In partnership with

the City of Seattle and NOAA, the State is installing four

systems on the Seattle waterfront that will be used for alert

and notification but also have chemical detectors, a weather

station, cameras, and seismometers allowing real-time

reporting for all hazards.This proof of concept will be

completed in May 2005.The AHAB Radio won the 2004

National Earthquake Conference Award of Excellence.

EMD, the State/Local Tsunami Workshop in partnership with

the Provincial Emergency Program, British Columbia, and

Olympic Peninsula Intertribal Cultural Advisory Committee

developed an Earthquake Tsunami Tribal Video for the K-6

State Tsunami Curriculum. Elements include a native

storyteller from the Hoh Tribe and an imaginative and

dramatic two-dimensional animated story of a large

earthquake and tsunami off the Washington coast, as seen

through the eyes of a young boy.This video is the first of its

kind and was showcased at an Earthquake Tribal Workshop

hosted by the Quinault Nation in April 2004. A State of

Washington Certificate of Commendation signed by the

Governor was presented to the storyteller in the video for her

outstanding work to better prepare children and families for

an earthquake or a tsunami through the creative use of

Northwest Coastal Native American oral history, art, and

culture.The film is now available in Alaska, California, and

Oregon; eight South Pacific Nations have been given

permission to reproduce the video for use in their public

education programs.

EMD and the Quinault Nation partnered to host the first

Earthquake Workshop for Tribes in Washington State. Federal,

state, and tribal representatives participated in this workshop

that educated tribal officials on the earthquake and tsunami

threat in the state and provided public education materials

and training opportunities specifically for tribal officials. Many

of the speakers were tribal members, ensuring that

information important to them was disseminated and

provided a backdrop for tribes to showcase their efforts in

emergency management for possible use as a template by

other tribes.The workshop featured a field trip to areas of

subsidence along the Washington coast that provided linkage

of scientific evidence to coastal Native American oral history.

The workshop has increased the understanding of tribal

needs, how to better approach those requirements, and has

enhanced cooperation among government-to-government

officials.

A 2-year project to develop a comprehensive scenario

discussing the impacts of a potential M6.7 earthquake on the

Seattle Fault and providing recommendations for policy

makers will be completed in 2004.The recommendations

will focus on mitigation. Development of the scenario project

is guided by a multi-disciplinary, public/private steering

committee. Funding support is provided by the EERI. Among

the organizations involved in the project are EMD, City of

Seattle, City of Bellevue, USGS, Structural Engineers

Association of Washington, ASCE, University of Washington,

and CREW. HAZUS was used to develop the scenario, which

will provide the framework for engineers, emergency

managers, and response personnel to identify key policy

issues that coincide with the Washington Emergency

Management Council’s Seismic Safety 2004 Policy

Recommendations.

Washington was the first state in the Nation to receive FEMA

approval of its enhanced hazard mitigation plan.The plan

identifies earthquakes as one of the state’s priority hazards.

The concept of “best available science” required by land-use

planning in the State was used to develop the plan’s hazard

profiles for earthquake, tsunami, and landslide. EMD provided

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Washington State’s Project Impact Earthquake Home Retrofit Handbook cover.
these and other natural hazard profiles to all local jurisdictions

around the State for use in local hazard mitigation plans.The

profiles are posted on the EMD web site and have been used

by a variety of individuals and groups.

In February 2003, EMD partnered again with Seattle Project

Impact, a public-private mitigation partnership led by the City

of Seattle Emergency Management, to develop a toolkit.

Under the Disaster Resistant Business (DRB) Program,

partners have spent 18 months building the DRB Toolkit to

assist businesses of all types and sizes to prepare themselves

against all-hazards using best practices and low-cost strategies.

The DRB Program is using industry experts to create easy-tofollow steps that will assist businesses to create their own

disaster plan if they do not have one, or improve a plan that

already exists. Seattle Project Impact will use the website as a

clearinghouse for business disaster solutions and examples.

The DRB Toolkit will be an interactive web-based resource

that can be used within the region or anywhere it is needed.

Under Seattle Project Impact’s Regional Home Retrofit

Program, 19 cities and counties are now participating on the

earthquake strengthening effort. Based on the standard type of

construction used throughout the state before earthquake

code adoption, over 250,000 houses are vulnerable. In 2003,

EMD connected the SSC-Buildings representative to the

Regional Home Retrofit effort, as he is also a representative of

the Washington Association of Building Officials. Including

building officials in this program has been a key to success, as

all of the retrofits are permit-driven to provide quality control

in following the pre-engineered prescriptive standards. Over

600 homes have been retrofitted to date.

The Nisqually Earthquake provided an opportunity to

showcase mitigation success and also provide increased

mitigation efforts through the HMGP. Examples of HMGP

awards are:

• City of Aberdeen – Fire Station Seismic Retrofit:

This project completed a seismic retrofit in the main fire

station that installed positive connections for the overhead

beam structures and seismic switches and sensors to open

apparatus doors at the time of sensing seismic movement.

As part of the grant, the city completed a hazard

mitigation plan.

• Highline Water District – Reservoir Seismic

Retrofit: Highline Water District completed two separate

seismic retrofits and pipe flexibility projects at seven sites.

These involved retrofitting standpipes, elevating tanks,

and protecting ground level tanks to ensure operation

and continuity after an event for drinking water and fire

protection. As part of the grant, a hazard mitigation plan

has been developed.

• Clark College – Structural Seismic Retrofit: This

project provided for structural seismic improvements to

seven buildings on the Clark College campus, including

pinning of bricks. Structural reinforcements will improve

performance and reduce the potential for damage, loss,

hardship, and suffering to students and staff.

Other Organizations

The NEHRP is a partnership of many organizations that have

the common goal of keeping us safe from the earthquake

hazard.The organizations involved in earthquake risk

reduction activities range from engineering-based

professional organizations, private sector organizations,

universities, and building code organizations to organizations

supported by one or more of the four NEHRP agencies, such

as the earthquake engineering centers (EERCs) that were

established by the NSF in 1997. Highlights of some of the

many successful activities conducted by professional

organizations in support of Goal A are described below.

Earthquake Engineering Research Institute

The EERI is a national, nonprofit technical society of

engineers, geoscientists, architects, planners, public officials,

and social scientists.The objective of EERI, which was

founded in 1949, is to reduce earthquake risk by advancing

the science and practice of earthquake engineering, by

improving understanding of the impact of earthquakes on the

physical, social, economic, political, and cultural

environment, and by advocating comprehensive and realistic

measures for reducing the harmful effects of earthquakes.

The Northern California chapter of EERI has held several

workshops, with FEMA support, to transmit technical

engineering knowledge to more than 200 building officials

and water and school district managers.The technical

engineering knowledge will enable them to better prepare for

earthquakes in northern California by putting into practice

new programs to strengthen their systems, address nonstructural hazards, and identify structurally vulnerable

buildings. Many of these earthquake techniques are easily

transferable to other natural and technological hazards and to

Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD).

During the past 2 years, EERI has been able to use funds in

the Cooperative Agreement to support travel for dozens of

students and young professionals to attend the EERI Annual

meetings, to learn about the latest research and design

techniques that improve understanding of the seismic hazard,

the design and rehabilitation of buildings and other

structures, and social and policies issues that currently

challenge seismic risk reduction.

22
Initiated through an EERI Technical Seminar in Seattle, EERI

members and others have been drawing on funds from the

EERI Endowment, plus additional support from the FEMA

Cooperative Agreement, to develop a comprehensive,

multidisciplinary, seismic risk scenario and Call to Action for

Puget Sound.The scenario development led by EERI members

brought together members of the Washington Structural

Engineers Association, the state Division of Emergency

Services, FEMA Region X, the USGS, and CREW in a major

voluntary effort to create this valuable tool.The completed

scenario will be distributed to more than 2,000 EERI

members in the United States in CD-ROM format and printed

and distributed to decision makers and others in the Puget

Sound area. It will be publicly unveiled in early 2005 by the

State of Washington’s Emergency Management Division, in a

public forum aimed at the region’s decision makers. It will

also serve as a valuable model for other communities that

wish to develop a scenario to help create public interest in

and support for the adoption of seismic risk reduction

policies.

Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering

Research

The goal of MCEER, which is housed at the State University of

New York at Buffalo, is to enhance the seismic resiliency of

communities through improved engineering and

management tools for critical infrastructure. MCEER works

toward this goal by conducting integrated research, outreach,

and education activities. MCEER maintains a clearinghouse of

earthquake publications and resources on its website.

MCEER researchers have made many key contributions to the

two most advanced building codes and seismic guidelines

over the years. MCEER researchers have continued to engage

practitioners through their contributions in the ATC (under

sponsorship of the FEMA ATC-58 project).The nextgeneration performance-based seismic design procedures

developed under this project will express performance

directly in terms of the quantified risks that the building

owner or decision maker will be able to understand.These

risks may be expressed in a variety of formats, including

expected loss for a given earthquake event, probable

maximum loss over a given number of years, the probability

of loss exceeding a specified value over a period of years, the

net present value of future potential losses, average annualized

loss, and other formats depending on the needs of individual

decision makers. Stakeholder guidance will be developed to

assist decision makers in selecting appropriate risk levels as

the basis of design and upgrade projects. Engineering

guidelines will be prepared to assist design professionals to

develop building designs that are reliable and capable of

meeting the selected risk criteria.The ATC-58 project is

completely oriented toward implementation and does not

undertake new research. Instead, it draws upon available

existing information and upon new research results that will

be generated during the life of the project. Given the

considerable body of new knowledge generated by MCEER on

the seismic retrofit of structural and nonstructural systems

and components in acute care facilities and on the

development of decision support methodologies, MCEER will

become a natural “feed” to this important implementation

project.

Natural Hazards Research and Applications Information

Center

The NHRAIC works to strengthen communication between

the hazards academic and applications communities to

improve the implementation of hazard mitigation and

emergency management programs. It is a widely recognized

resource for researchers and practitioners who wish to obtain

the most current knowledge available to solve hazard-related

problems.The Center accomplishes its work through four

major activities: information dissemination, an annual

workshop, information services, and research.The majority of

the Center’s work is supported by a NSF grant. During this

reporting period, nine other federal agencies contributed

funds to NSF to support the grant.

The Center’s information dissemination program is composed

of three parts: production of the bimonthly newsletter, the

Natural Hazards Observer; publication of monographs, working

papers, Quick Response (OR) research reports, special

publications, bibliographies, and other reports, including the

Natural Hazards Informer series and the Natural Hazards Review

journal; and Internet activities, which include the distribution

of an electronic newsletter, Disaster Research, and maintenance of

a web site.

The Natural Hazards Observer, now in its 28th year of publication,

is the Center’s most visible and highly regarded activity. Since

2001, the Observer has devoted considerable attention to the

consequences of the September 11 terrorist attacks, as well as

to homeland security policies and programs.The “On the

Line” section of the Observer included commentaries on

emergency evacuation of individuals with special needs,

FEMA’s multi-hazard mapping initiative, community-based

preparedness for urban/wildland fires, and the legislation,

policies, and principles that serve as the basis for all-hazards

emergency planning. In 2003, the Observer was distributed to

over 15,000 individuals in the United States and abroad. In

addition to hard-copy mailings, each issue of the Observer is

available on-line via the Center’s web site in both html and

PDF formats.

The Center’s publications program includes many types of

publications.These publications range from full-length

research studies (monographs), to research-in-progress or

article-length discussions (working papers), bibliographies,

23
QR research reports, and other special publications.The

Center also publishes the Natural Hazards Informer series, and in

cooperation with the ASCE, the Natural Hazards Review journal.

In 2003, the Center completed a 604-page Special Publication

containing findings from QR research undertaken in the

aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.The

volume, Beyond September 11:An Account of Post-Disaster Research

(SP39), contains contributions from researchers who received

funding from the Center, as well as from researchers funded

through other sources. During FY 2003, seven new QR

reports were published, all of which are available free on-line.

In 1999, the Natural Hazards Center established a state-ofthe-art publications series called the Natural Hazards Informer.

Written by experts in the field, each issue features a summary

and synthesis of current information on a specific hazards

topic, as well as a description of emerging knowledge about

which readers should be aware. An electronic version of each

issue of the Informer is available from the Center’s web site,

thereby making the series accessible to a wider audience.

The Natural Hazards Review is dedicated to bringing together

authors representing the physical, social, and behavioral

sciences; engineering; and regulatory and policy disciplines in

a forum that addresses cutting edge, holistic, and crossdisciplinary approaches to natural hazards loss and cost

reduction.

The Center distributes a bi-weekly, worldwide electronic

newsletter, Disaster Research (DR), via the Internet. DR provides

information about recent disasters; research-in-progress;

legislative, policy, and institutional developments; new

programs, projects, and information sources; and upcoming

meetings. Perhaps more important, the newsletter allows

subscribers to post queries, responses, and comments to the

entire readership and thus facilitates global access to

knowledgeable individuals and resources.

The Center also maintains the Natural Hazards Center Web

Site from which a wealth of information can be accessed

(http://www.colorado.edu/hazards). Back issues of DR and

the Observer and other Center publications, the Center’s library

database (HazLit), and materials from the annual hazards

workshop are complemented by extensive lists of resources of

information about hazards.These include contact information

for hazards-related agencies, organizations, and institutions; a

roster of useful periodicals; abstracts of recent hazards

literature; links to other hazards information sources; and a

comprehensive schedule of upcoming conferences. In 2003,

staff devoted a considerable amount of time to redesigning

the web site to make it more user-friendly.

The 28th annual invitational Hazards Research and

Applications Workshop was held in Boulder, Colorado, July

13-16, 2003.This event was attended by 333 public- and

private-sector professionals involved in all aspects of hazards.

About 11 percent of the participants were from outside the

United States. Countries represented included Australia,

Canada, Japan, Mexico, and Switzerland.

The library of the Natural Hazards Center is one of the largest

in the United States and worldwide, covering materials on the

social science aspects of natural, technological, and humaninduced hazards and on strategies for reducing losses from

those events. Library holdings currently include over 28,000

books, periodicals, reports, individual articles, CDs,

videotapes, and other materials.The library is available for use

by students, researchers, practitioners, and others seeking to

obtain information regarding hazard-related issues.

In September 2003, a consortium of which the Center is a

member received an information technology research (ITR)

grant from the NSF.The 5-year ITR project, which is entitled

“Responding to the Unexpected,” is headquartered at the

University of California at Irvine.The project seeks to explore

ways in which advanced information technology solutions

can be used to improve the management of extreme events

such as major earthquakes and terrorist attacks. Partners in the

project, which is known as “RESCUE-ITR” (“Responding to

Crises and Unexpected Events”), include the City and County

of Los Angeles, the City of San Diego, and the City of Irvine.

The Center’s role in the project will be twofold: to develop a

better understanding of the factors associated with the

24

The Natural Hazards Observer cover.
adoption and implementation of advanced technologies in

emergency management and to provide research-based input

into modeling efforts, e.g., behavioral and risk communication

modeling, that are being undertaken by other investigators.

Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center

The PEER Center is an engineering research center

administered under the NSF’s Engineering Research Centers

Program and is headquartered at the University of California

at Berkeley.The PEER Center is a part of NSF’s program to

reduce losses due to earthquakes through the NEHRP.The

Federal Government, the State of California, and private

industry provide funding for PEER. Investigators from over 20

universities and several consulting companies conduct

research in earthquake-related geohazard assessment,

engineering seismology, risk management, public policy, and

geotechnical and structural engineering.

The mission of PEER is to “develop and disseminate

performance-based earthquake engineering (PBEE)

methodology and supporting technologies to meet the safety,

functionality, and economic needs of owners and society.”

PBEE is the current widely accepted state-of-the-art

methodology for the seismic design of buildings and other

structures, in which owners and other decision makers define

performance targets in terms of safety, cost, and functionality

needs.This approach translates these performance targets into

engineering criteria that aim to produce facilities that perform

to expectations.To help make seismic hazard mitigation more

cost effective, the PEER Center has undertaken a user-driven

research approach where researchers, funding entities, and

those who implement seismic hazard mitigation work

together to develop credible and useful contributions to

increasing seismic safety throughout the United States and

international communities.The PEER Center’s research and

technology transfer activities contribute to the four major

goals of the NEHRP by helping to systematically reduce

seismic risk through the development of PBEE technologies

and products, the transfer of the results of PEER’s research to

the public and private sectors, and in the training of future

students, engineers, and researchers.

PEER’s research has two heavily interrelated major

components: the Core Program and the Lifelines Program.

Under the Core Program, the PEER Center is developing PBEE

technologies that address the economic and safety needs of

property owners and society. Applied research for utilities and

transportation systems is conducted under the Lifelines

Program.

PEER undertook a number of earthquake mitigation activities

during this reporting period for Goal A. From a broader

societal perspective, PEER’s work is contributing to a better

understanding of how performance-based regulations fit

within the broader regulatory system. Performance-based

approaches are founded on the notion that regulations should

be based on achievement of specified results rather than on

adherence to particular technologies or prescribed means.

This notion has been widely accepted as a basis for improving

social and environmental regulations; variants of

performance-based regulations have been adopted for aspects

of air and water quality, building and fire safety, consumer

product safety, energy efficiency, food safety, forest practices,

nuclear power plants, pipeline safety, and worker safety.

Adoption of performance-based regulations requires

consideration of how to characterize outcomes, what

constitutes desired achievements with respect to the

outcomes, and how to measure the level of performance that

is obtained. In addressing these fundamental questions from

the perspective of affected stakeholders, PEER is laying the

groundwork so that PBEE will be an effective basis for

achieving building and infrastructure earthquake safety.

PEER has developed significantly improved understanding of

the building blocks of PBEE. In the area of strong ground

motion, PEER has created extensive databases that allow us to

better characterize and predict future earthquake shaking that

may affect a facility or network. In the area of engineering,

PEER has developed improved models for ground failure

(fault rupture and liquefaction); procedures for mitigating

ground failure; methods for evaluating failure of existing

hazardous buildings, bridges, and electric utility systems;

25

PEER has created extensive databases that allow us to better characterize and

predict future earthquake shaking that may affect a facility or network.
design procedures for improved performance of existing and

new facilities; and models for performance of building

contents. In areas of loss modeling, PEER is developing

procedures for computing losses and ways of customizing

these to meet specific client needs.

PEER is sponsoring research to hasten the adoption and

utilization of performance-based risk management among

major stakeholders (facility owners and operators, risk

managers and insurers, and building-code officials). PEER has

contributed to various aspects of earthquake risk

management, including work to articulate decision

considerations, evaluate earthquake losses, and facilitate

implementation of PBEE tools and frameworks. On the topic

of decision considerations, PEER has contributed fundamental

knowledge on the basis for decisions, including the framing

of decisions, financial and other tools for evaluating choices,

and studies of how to best present the metrics to stakeholders.

PEER has discovered the importance of emphasizing tradeoffs,

as opposed to absolute decision metrics, with one important

exception being concerns about catastrophic events leading to

“risk-of-ruin.” On the subject of earthquake losses, PEER has

improved fundamental knowledge of the losses and costs

associated with structural and non-structural damage to

buildings. On implementation, PEER has investigated issues

and barriers associated with moving from current prescriptive

building codes to emerging performance-based regulations.

NEHRP Accomplishments:

Goal B

Goal B activities assure the availability of improved techniques

to reduce the seismic vulnerability of facilities and systems.

These improvements are achieved through several means,

including publication of design, construction, and evaluation

guidelines for buildings and lifelines; development of tools to

assist in the use of the guidelines; problem-focused research

and development to fill knowledge gaps; execution of

coordinated post-earthquake investigations; publication of

long-term studies to address special problems identified after

major earthquakes; cooperation with professional and trade

associations to improve the use of technology; advocacy; and

the international exchange of information.

Goal B: Improve techniques to reduce seismic

vulnerability of facilities and systems

1: Facilitate technology transfer among standards

organizations, state and local governments, and privatesector professionals.

2: Improve earthquake loss-reduction knowledge and the

quality of practice.

3: Support efforts to improve seismic standards and codes

and improve design and construction practices for

buildings and lifelines.

The NEHRP Agencies

Federal Emergency Management Agency

The Building Seismic Safety Council (BSSC) of NIBS has

partnered with FEMA since the agency’s inception to achieve

the goals of the NEHRP, primarily to develop effective

practices and policies for earthquake loss-reduction and

accelerate their implementation and to improve techniques to

reduce seismic vulnerability of facilities and systems.

During FY 2003 and 2004, the BSSC completed work on the

2003 edition of the NEHRP Recommended Provisions for Seismic

Regulations for New Buildings and Other Structures. The seventh edition

of this landmark work reflects the results of recent research

and includes seismic design maps based on current USGS

hazard maps.The 2003 Provisions document and its

accompanying Commentary (FEMA Publication 450, Parts I and

II) have the consensus approval of the 64 BSSC member

organizations and reflect the voluntary efforts of

approximately 200 of the Nation’s experts on seismic design

and construction who contributed their time and expertise in

the national interest.

In response to life safety concerns expressed to FEMA by

officials in the State of Washington, the BSSC mounted an

effort during FY 2004 to develop up-to-date earthquake

performance guidance concerning the large steel storage racks

commonly used in large home supply and discount stores.

In complementary efforts funded by FEMA, the BSSC’s Code

Resource Support Committee (CRSC) worked to advance

incorporation of the Provisions’requirements in the Nation’s

model building codes and standards. Proposals for change

based on the 2003 Provisions have been developed for

incorporation in the 2006 editions of the ICC’s IBC and IRC.

CRSC representatives also worked on the committees

developing the NFPA model building code, and are involved

in the process to update that document. Further, participants

in the BSSC Provisions update process developed a proposal to

modify the seismic provisions in the national load standard

(ASCE 7) published by the ASCE to reflect the 2003 Provisions.

CRSC representatives have responded to local requests for

assistance in adopting the Provisions-based seismic requirements

appearing in the model building codes.

Work to update documents produced earlier by the BSSC to

stimulate awareness and use of the NEHRP Recommended Provisions

and to serve as the basis for education and training programs

was initiated during the past 2 fiscal years and is nearing

completion.These documents include a guide to application

26
of the 2000 and 2003 NEHRP Recommended Provisions (FEMA

Publication 351), a non-technical explanation of the Provisions

(FEMA Publication 99), and a new version of FEMA’s guide

for homebuilders that introduces the seismic provisions in the

2000 IRC (FEMA Publication 232). BSSC volunteer experts

participated in a variety of meetings and conferences to

introduce the concepts embodied in the Provisions.

The MMC of NIBS has conducted several projects related the

NEHRP goals to develop effective practices and policies for

earthquake loss-reduction and accelerate their

implementation, improve techniques to reduce seismic

vulnerability of facilities and systems, and improve seismic

hazard identification and risk assessment methods and their

use.The American Lifelines Alliance (ALA) was established by

FEMA in 1998 as a public-private partnership to reduce the

earthquake risks to lifelines (essential utility and

transportation systems that serve communities across all

jurisdictions).When the MMC began managing the ALA at

the beginning of FY 2003, the scope of ALA efforts was

broadened to encompass all hazards. Several earthquakespecific projects and several all-hazards projects considering

earthquake risks were conducted in FY 2003-2004:

• The development of a guideline providing

comprehensive but easy to follow guidance for the

seismic design of piping systems in essential facilities

such as power plants, chemical process facilities, oil and

gas distribution systems and terminals, and critical postdisaster facilities such as hospitals.

• The development of a guideline presenting design

provisions for use in evaluating the integrity of buried

pipelines for a variety of applied loads, including

earthquake ground motion.The ASME B31 Guideline

Committee is considering the integration of this guidance

into its standard.

• The development of proposals for revising the above

ground steel storage tank seismic design requirements

contained in American Petroleum Institute (API) and

American Water Works Association (AWWA) standards.

API and AWWA standards featuring the revised

requirements are being balloted.

• The development of a guide presenting the available

performance data for six classes of mechanical

components that often must perform critical functions

during and after earthquakes (valves, valve operators,

pumps, compressors, fans, and packaged air-handling

units).

• The development of a set of design provisions to provide

water utilities with clear and practical guidance for

designing water pipelines with improved resistance to

damage from earthquakes.

• The development of procedures that can be used to

evaluate the probability of earthquake damage to water

transmission systems.

• The development of guidelines for use by electric poser,

oil and natural gas pipeline, and wastewater system

owners and operators in defining the scope of actions

necessary to assess system performance during and after

hazard events.

• The periodic assessment of ALA-developed matrices that

provide an overview of the current status of natural and

manmade hazards guidance available to lifeline system

operators in the United States.

National Institute of Standards and Technology

The NEHRP Strategic Plan identified a technology transfer gap

that limits the adaptation of basic research knowledge into

practice.The Strategic Plan recommends an expanded

problem-focused research and guidelines development effort

to facilitate the implementation of new mitigation

technologies.

As a first step, NIST requested the ATC to convene a workshop

of national leaders in earthquake design, practice, regulation,

and construction in July 2002.The purpose of the workshop

was to assess the state of knowledge and practice and to

suggest an action plan to address the gap between research

and practice.The action plan identifies industry priorities in

two areas: (1) support of the seismic code development

process through technical assistance and development of the

technical basis for performance standards; and (2) improved

seismic design productivity through the development of tools

for the evaluation of advanced technologies and practices.The

action plan, “The Missing Piece: Improving Seismic Design

and Construction Practices (ATC-57),” was published in 2003

and is available from the ATC, www.atcouncil.org. NIST now

looks forward to working with the stakeholder community to

explore ways to best meet those needs via a public-private

partnership. NIST expects this effort will build on NSF-funded

basic research, including that conducted as part of the George

E. Brown, Jr. NEES Consortium.

In the aftermath of the World Trade Center Disaster, Congress

gave NIST the authority to investigate major building failures

in the United States, including those caused by earthquakes.

The National Construction Safety Team (NCST) Act gives NIST

the authority to dispatch teams of experts within 48 hours 

27
following a major building disaster.The Act specifies that the

NIST Director develop implementing procedures that

“provide for coordination with Federal, State, and local

entities that may sponsor research or investigation of building

failures, including research conducted under the Earthquake

Hazards Reduction Act of 1977.” In addition, the Committee

Report 107-530 published by the House Science Committee

on June 25, 2002 states that, “The Director should clearly

define how earthquake researchers and Teams will carry out

their responsibilities in a coordinated fashion in cases where

building failures have been caused by an earthquake.”

NIST’s responsibilities under the NCST Act have been

incorporated into the recently completed plan to coordinate

post-earthquake investigations issued by the NEHRP agencies.

The plan (USGS Circular #1242) states that, within 48 hours,

NIST will examine the relevant factors associated with

building failures that occur as a result of the earthquake and

will make reasonable efforts to consult with the other NEHRP

agencies before determining whether to conduct an

investigation under the Act. Any NIST investigation conducted

under the authority of the Act will be limited to failures of

one or more buildings or on one class or type of building

selected by NIST. In early 2004, NIST participated in a series

of tabletop exercises with representatives from the other

NEHRP agencies.The exercises simulated the response to

earthquake scenarios in different parts of the United States to

test the plan.

NIST initiated a project to develop and implement

performance criteria for codes and standards, tools, and

practical guidance for prevention of progressive structural

collapse. Progressive collapse refers to the spread of a

structural failure–by a chain reaction–that is disproportionate

to a localized triggering failure, often due to abnormal loads.

Such collapse can result in a disproportionate loss of life and

injuries.The project is considering four distinct but

interrelated strategies to mitigate progressive collapse: (1)

System design concept; (2) Retard collapse after triggering

event; (3) Built-in redundancy via alternate load paths; and

(4) Retrofit and design to “harden” structure.

A key focus of the project is to develop retrofit and design

methods that take advantage of the synergies associated with

mitigating progressive collapse under multiple threats (blast,

impact, fire, wind, and earthquake).The project depends

heavily on the development and use of advanced modeling

and simulation tools to evaluate the vulnerability of structural

systems to progressive collapse under different threats.The

project is reviewing and using knowledge gained from

controlled demolition technology and builds on that

knowledge to develop effective mitigation strategies for

progressive collapse. Finally, the project is developing

performance criteria and methods to mitigate progressive

structural collapse cost-effectively for both new and existing

structures based on a combination of existing knowledge, the

results of analytical model sensitivity studies, and laboratory

and field measurements. NIST has completed a draft best

practices guideline and is currently revising the guideline

based on comments received from practitioners.The revised

guideline will be published in early 2005.

NIST is using a multi-hazard approach to facilitate the

development of mitigation technologies. In addition, building

fires can often result following an earthquake.The objective of

the Fire Safety Design and Retrofit of Structures project is to

develop significantly improved standards, tools, and practical

guidance for the fire safety design and retrofit of structures.

The project is focusing on standards and tools for design of

steel and concrete structures and on verified predictive tools

and performance criteria to evaluate structural fire

performance in real fires.

Five key factors are being considered in developing such

performance-based methods.

1. While the current standard fire endurance test method,

which stipulates a prescribed time-temperature exposure,

is adequate to compare relative performance of structural

components, it does not provide any indication about the

actual performance, i.e., load carrying capacity, of a

component in a real fire environment, i.e., involving fire

of building contents.

2. The role of structural connections, diaphragms, and

redundancy in enabling load transfer and maintaining

overall structural integrity during fire is ignored in

structural design. Current design methods are based on

fire endurance tests of single components and do not

account for the behavior of inter-component connections

or the complex two- and three-dimensional behavior of

the entire structure.

28

NIST’s Building and Fire Research Laboratory conducted standard fire tests at

the UL (Northbrook) Furnace.
3. There is a need to evaluate the effectiveness of alternative

retrofit, design, and fire protection strategies to enhance

structural fire endurance (including alternate

cementitious spray or board systems, intumescent

coatings, high-performance fire protective coatings, active

suppression systems, and more sensitive sensing and

monitoring). No practical, high-level models exist today

that couple the fire dynamics to the structural system

response, and the resulting transient, multi-dimensional

heat transfer through structural components made with

multiple materials.

4. There is a lack of knowledge about the fire behavior of

structures built with innovative materials, i.e., highstrength concrete or steel structures.

5. There is a need to better model and predict the fire

hazard to structures from internal and external fires, i.e.,

due to accidents or terrorist threats.This includes

deterministic and probabilistic models for specifying the

magnitude, location, and spatial distribution of fire

hazards on structures; determination of reliability-based

load factors for combined dead, live, and fire loads and

resistance factors for loss in structural strength and

stiffness; and methods for load and resistance factor

design (LRFD) under fire conditions.

The project is developing performance criteria and methods

to assure cost-effective structural performance under fire for

both retrofit and design applications based on a combination

of existing knowledge from around the world, the results of

analytical model sensitivity studies, and laboratory and field

measurements.

NIST chairs and provides the technical secretariat for the USJapan Joint Panel on Wind and Seismic Effects (UJNR).The

Panel provides a government-to-government forum for the

exchange of research data and information between countries

that share similar concerns regarding earthquake and wind

effects on the built environment.The Panel adopted a strategic

plan, jointly developed by NIST and the Public Works

Research Institute, at its 33rd Joint Meeting in May 2001.The

strategic plan streamlined the operation of the Panel and

emphasized the importance of joint research on topics of

mutual interest.The Panel has seven technical task committees

through which this cooperation occurs:

• Geotechnical Engineering and Ground Motion

• Next-Generation Building and Infrastructure Systems

• Dams

• Wind Engineering

• Transportation Systems

• Advanced Information and Communication Technology

for Disaster Prevention and Public Health

• Storm Surge and Tsunami

The Panel is actively exploring the formation of a Task

Committee on Fire Performance of Building and

Transportation Structures.This new Task Committee will be

formed jointly between the Panel on Wind and Seismic Effects

and the Panel on Fire Research and Safety.

The Task Committee on Transportation Systems completed a

joint guideline on testing of bridge isolation systems in

September 2004.This joint guideline establishes consistent

methods for evaluating performance of these systems and will

be published and used in both the United States and Japan.

The Panel held a successful 36th Joint Meeting in May 2004

at which 27 technical papers were presented. NIST published

the proceedings of the 36th Joint Meeting in September

2004.

National Science Foundation

Goal B activities sponsored by the NSF are described below

under the earthquake engineering research facilities funded

by NSF.

U.S. Geological Survey

In the Municipality of Anchorage, Alaska, the USGS worked in

conjunction with the UAF to integrate 14 new strong motion

recording systems with an existing network of 22 stations

operated by the UAF.The enhanced, 36-station network will

provide the critical data needed to generate near-real-time

ShakeMaps of the Anchorage area. USGS-led efforts in

Anchorage have significantly improved the quality and

quantity of seismic instrumentation needed for emergency

response and the assessment and mitigation of damaging

earthquakes in south-central Alaska.

As part of the Anchorage upgrades, ANSS instrumented the

20-story, State of Alaska (Atwood) building with digital

sensor systems located at 10 levels throughout the structure.

The USGS Menlo Park office was responsible for installing the

structural monitoring system, while UAF personnel installed

the interconnecting conduit, cabling, and other ancillary

equipment.The ANSS funding also allowed for the installation

of sensors and recording systems for a network of six

underground (borehole) recording stations located adjacent

to the Atwood Building.The combined network represents

one of the best instrumented urban areas and soil/structure

systems in the country. Data recorded by this network will be

29
invaluable to civil and structural engineers for assessing soilstructure interaction, building response, and building

performance during large earthquakes.

The Atwood Building installation was unveiled at an event

commemorating the 40th anniversary of the 1964 Good

Friday earthquake.The March 26 event was sponsored by the

USGS, the UAF GI, and members of the local engineering

community. Alaska is the most seismically active state in the

United States, and the Good Friday earthquake, at moment

magnitude 9.2, was the second largest earthquake ever

recorded.

Selected State, Territorial, And Local Accomplishments

Alaska

The UAF/GI installed real time earthquake monitoring

equipment in the State Emergency Coordination Center

(SECC). The system provides immediate earthquake

notification showing seismic station depictions of the quake,

scientific data, and graphically relates the earthquake to

adjacent communities. It allows the SECC to quickly contact

communities to gather impact data for potential damage

estimates. Alaska is installing this system in other emergency

operation centers around the state.

Hawaii

SCD sponsored a series of statewide professional structural

and non-structural seismic safety workshops. Structural

engineers from the DOI, Bureau of Reclamation, presented at

the workshops, which were videotaped for future broadcast

on public access channels.

HSEAC also provided technical review of state dam safety

earthquake construction standards at the request of the State

Department of Land and Natural Resources.

Missouri

SEMA’s Earthquake Program Manager continues to act as staff

to the Missouri Seismic Safety Commission to urge the

adoption of building codes at the local level, support

earthquake education, and to sponsor outreach programs.

In addition, SEMA continues building a strong relationship

with the Missouri Department of Insurance to educate

Missouri’s citizens, local government, and the insurance

industry about ways to mitigate earthquake damages and the

need for appropriate insurance coverage in endangered areas,

and to plan for responding to a major earthquake.

Oregon

Oregon conducted a state-wide earthquake exercise QUAKEX

2003 in April 2003, participated in City of Portland full-scale

earthquake exercise Shake Ex 04, and produced the Earthquake

Preparedness and Mitigation Guidance.

Washington

In partnership with the NTHMP, EMD continues to work with

the engineering community to investigate whether there are

adequate building designs available for both high seismic

loading (zone 4 or equivalent in the IBC) and a tsunami

inundation area. An example of the problem is Ocean Shores,

which would be subject to strong shaking from a Cascadia

Subduction Zone earthquake and tsunami inundation within

30 minutes, giving no time for evacuation.This workshop is

developing guidance for retrofitting buildings to withstand

both the earthquake and tsunami.This year, data has been

collected to assess construction requirements of structures

requiring earthquake and tsunami design and workshops have

been held to review and agree to proposal requirements.This

data will be given to FEMA for development of a structural

guidance document within the next 3 years.

Other Organizations

Earthquake Engineering Research Institute

NEHRP support has made it possible for EERI to develop and

distribute many new publications, including oral histories,

monographs, post-earthquake reconnaissance reports, and

CD-ROMs from recent damaging earthquakes.These

publications are aimed at the engineering and design

communities, and disseminate the latest analytical and design

techniques. Monographs issued in this period focus on bridge

design, energy dissipation systems, and risk analysis, and will

enable practicing engineers to incorporate these new

techniques into the design and rehabilitation of new and

existing buildings and bridges.These publications are 

30

The ANSS funding also allowed for the installation of sensors and recording

systems for a network of six underground (borehole) recording stations located

adjacent to the Atwood Building..
distributed free of charge to over 2,000 EERI members

throughout the United States and abroad.

Each year, EERI has awarded a Fellowship to a practicing

professional from one of the many fields that contribute to

earthquake engineering, to enable that person to gain greater

skills and broader expertise in earthquake hazards reduction.

In recent years, the fellowships have supported work of

professionals in structural engineering, tsunami hazard

mitigation, and the earth sciences.The results of their research

projects have been incorporated into current building codes

and practices, into tsunami hazard modeling, and most

recently by helping to bridge the gap between geologists and

geotechnical engineers in better understanding the

mechanism of liquefaction in earthquakes.

Each year, NEHRP funds also have supported a graduate

research fellow from engineering, earth science, or public

policy in the completion of their graduate studies.This

fellowship is prestigious and very highly sought after.

Students have been selected from many universities

throughout the United States.Their work has contributed to

the goals of NEHRP by developing new tools specific to each

of their disciplines that will reduce losses from future

earthquakes. All of the recipients have gone on to careers as

highly regarded researchers in earthquake engineering or

related fields of public policy and decision sciences. Many are

in academic positions, where they are influencing a whole

new generation to embrace a commitment to earthquake

hazard mitigation.

Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering

Research

As part of its research dedicated to the seismic retrofit of

acute care facilities, MCEER initiated a co-operative

experimental program with National Taiwan University and

the National Center for Research on Earthquake Engineering

(NCREE) to investigate the seismic performance of Shear

Plated Walls (SPW) designed and fabricated using low yield

strength (LYS) steel panels and Reduced Beam Sections (RBS)

added to the beam ends. A total of four LYS SPW specimens

were designed by MCEER researchers, fabricated in Taiwan,

and tested collaboratively by MCEER and NCREE researchers

at the NCREE laboratory in Taiwan.

The results of the tests indicated that SPW buildings with low

yield steel webs appear to be a viable option for use in

resistance of lateral loads imparted during seismic excitation.

Collaborative research between MCEER and NCREE is now

focusing on developing reliable models that can capture the

experimentally observed behavior, and investigating the

benefits of this system on enhancing the seismic performance

of nonstructural components in acute care facilities.

An advanced systems analysis expands the frontiers of science

and engineering by enabling, for the first time, a quantitative

prediction of functional degradation of the utility power

network under natural and manmade disasters.The

degradation of the power network can severely impact the

economy and welfare of the community it serves. MCEER’s

multi-institutional and multidisciplinary team of investigators

(involving more than 20 students with diverse backgrounds)

collaborated with industry users such as Los Angeles

Department of Water and Power (LADWP), Southern

California Edison, Memphis Light Gas and Water, and with

international partners such as Taiwan Power and NCREE in

Taiwan, and Bridgestone Corporation in Japan.This

collaboration led to the development of a pioneering software

system integrating Western Electricity Coordinating Council’s

(WECC) power grid database with the Electric Power

Research Institute’s (EPRI) Interactive Power Flow analysis

code.WECC’s database covers 14 western states and beyond.

This integration is achieved through an advanced GIS

framework that allows visual demonstration of the impact of

disasters. Innovative use of GIS allows incorporation of natural

hazard and infrastructure information and societal data (such

as location and number of households served by the

network).The software can predict, for example, the

possibility of power black-out in each service area of LADWP

in Los Angeles after an earthquake, also demonstrating that

events as remotely located as the State of Washington can have

an impact on Los Angeles. It allows stakeholders to decide if

such a possibility is acceptable for various earthquake

scenarios, and whether proposed seismic retrofit schemes can

be cost-effective. Efforts are continuing to upgrade the

software to integrate both of LADWP’s water and power

networks, and to assess their combined and interdependent

performance during an earthquake.

Using finite element analyses and full-scale experiments on

pipe specimens supplied by the LADWP, MCEER researchers

31

MCEER Shear Plated Wall (SPW) specimen being tested at the National

Center for Research on Earthquake Engineering (NCREE) in Taiwan.
developed fiber reinforced polymers (FRPs) in collaboration

with industry participants.When the FRPs are wrapped

around the joints of large diameter water pipelines during

new construction or retrofit activities, they substantially

increase the axial load capacity of the joints, in many cases

doubling pipeline resistance against earthquake compressive

loads.The FRPs are now commercially available from several

companies. Model contract documents and specifications for

FRP strengthening are being prepared by LADWP and MCEER

in the construction of over $100 million of new trunk lines

in Los Angeles. MCEER researchers also developed and

executed the largest laboratory experiments ever performed of

ground rupture effects on buried pipelines.The experiments

were used to validate an analytical model for evaluating

ground rupture effects on pipeline bends, which are critical

locations for stress concentration.The analytical model and

experimental results were used to make inexpensive changes

in welds and wall thickness at the bends that increase capacity

by over 100 percent.The work was recognized by the Japan

Gas Association Best Paper Award in 2003 and was used to

develop a Large Displacement Soil-Structure Interaction

Facility for Lifelines at Cornell University, which will be part

of the George E. Brown, Jr. NEES sponsored by NSF.

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is overseeing

MCEER’s ongoing work to produce design guidelines for use

by highway bridge engineers on the following subjects:

seismic retrofitting of highway bridges and other highway

structures such as retaining walls, slopes, tunnels, pavements,

and culverts; seismic retrofitting of highway bridge trusses;

seismic isolation of highway bridges; and seismic behavior of

timber bridges.These references will help transportation

agencies and their engineers assess the risk of seismic damage

to bridges and take appropriate action to mitigate the risk.

These publications are being made available to potential users

to disseminate knowledge gained from recent research.

Workshops are planned as a means of introducing these into

the engineering community.

MCEER conducted a research task to develop ways of

improving the seismic performance of slab-on-girder steel

bridges through the use of embedded energy dissipators and

intelligent semi-active control devices located at or in the

end-diaphragms.The relative flexibility of these bridges in the

transverse direction may result in overstressing or even failure

of load-carrying components such as the end-diaphragms,

beams, shear connectors between the deck and girders,

bearings, piers, and columns. By using structural dampers or

semi-active devices to dissipate energy at the end diaphragms,

the safety and reliability of steel bridges can be improved.The

results of this research will enable the development of

guidelines for use in the design of new bridges and the

retrofit of existing bridges using control devices to optimize

structural performance and safety.

MCEER has conducted a study on energy dissipation of

compression members in concentrically braced frames, and is

conducting experimental work to expand this knowledge to

improve the seismic performance of steel truss bridges and

piers.

Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center

In the event of a major earthquake, those who are called upon

as first responders will be critical to determining how

emergencies are handled, including police officers,

emergency operators, hospital staff, and fire fighters. Before

these emergency personnel can even begin to do their job

properly, however, they need electric power.

As a result of research sponsored by the California Energy

Commission’s PIER program and PG&E, and conducted by the

PEER, new tools and methods are being developed to make

electric power transmission more reliable in the event of a

major seismic event. Among the areas under study are the

substations that receive and distribute electricity to large areas.

The major causes of outages during past earthquakes were the

catastrophic failures of circuit breakers, transformer bushings,

and disconnect switches at the substations.

Concrete is a popular building material. For the most part, it

serves its purpose well.To perform well during earthquakes,

however, reinforced concrete buildings and bridges need to

be properly reinforced with steel.This lesson has been learned

and relearned in past California earthquakes, including the

1971 San Fernando earthquake, 1979 Imperial Valley

earthquake, 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, and 1994

Northridge earthquake.

Many hazardous concrete buildings, including many

government buildings, also have high and important

occupancies, posing a significant life safety risk. One

challenge has been deciding whether a building is indeed at

high risk: earthquake engineers need better evaluation tools to

sort out the good buildings from the bad ones. Another

reason is the high cost of building retrofitting; better tools are

needed for cost-effective, non-intrusive retrofitting.

PEER has recognized the need and the challenge of mitigating

the high seismic risk posed by some of our older existing

building stock, and has devoted a significant portion of its

research activity toward this problem.

PEER researchers and industry practitioners have successfully

applied and tested the performance-based engineering

methodology through application to several building and

bridge case studies. In one case, the methodology has been

applied for the seismic assessment of a science laboratory on

the University of California at Berkeley campus to investigate

mitigation techniques for a high-tech laboratory as well as the

32
inter-relationships to the larger campus network of which the

laboratory building is a part.Working closely with

professional engineering consultants and university

administrators, PEER is providing campus administration with

tools to assess campus risk, to develop retrofit/mitigation

strategies, and to conduct disaster planning.This study is

being coordinated with a FEMA-supported Disaster Resistant

University initiative, whose aim is to develop a model that

other university and industrial campuses can follow. In a case

study of a highway bridge, PEER is working in collaboration

with CALTRANS and FHWA to investigate bridge performance

and its inter-relationships to highway network performance

needs for post-earthquake emergency response and recovery.

Demonstration of the PEER methodology through these and

other case studies is leading to broad acceptance of the

methodology in the earthquake engineering research and

practice communities.

The PEER Center work with other earthquake engineering

research centers in the United States and in Europe, Japan, and

Taiwan, already has led to the sharing of information

regarding specific PBEE research results for bridge

components and highway transportation system studies that

can help emergency response officials direct traffic around

major blockages.

NEHRP Accomplishments:

Goal C

Seismic hazard identification and risk assessment are critical

components of NEHRP’s earthquake mitigation strategy.

Under Goal C, NEHRP agencies identify and quantify seismic

hazards through improved seismic monitoring and through

detailed geological and geophysical characterization of

regions of active faulting.The seismic hazard information then

becomes the foundation upon which subsequent risk

assessment models are based.

Goal C: Improve seismic hazard identification and risk

assessment methods and their use

1: Provide rapid, reliable information about earthquakes and

earthquake-induced damage.

2: Improve seismic hazard characterization and mapping.

3: Support development and use of risk and loss assessment

tools.

The NEHRP Agencies

Federal Emergency Management Agency

Securing the Nation’s communities, businesses, housing, and

infrastructure from disasters requires a comprehensive

approach that includes hazard resistant construction, prudent

land use, emergency preparedness, rapid response and

recovery, and increased awareness of multiple threats.

Information on potential damage, shared at federal, state, and

local levels, is a key to these life-saving priorities.

To assess risk and share data effectively requires a nationally

applicable, computer-based disaster planning and analysis tool

able to:

• Estimate size and location of possible threats

• Calculate resulting damage and disruption

• Utilize supporting data from varied sources

• Link with other emergency management and planning

tools before, during, and after disasters

In 1992, through agreements with FEMA, the NIBS began

crafting such a tool, beginning with the potential effects of

earthquakes. Methodologies reviewed by seismic experts were

programmed into advanced, easily usable software called

HAZUS. Before the debut of HAZUS in 1997, plotting the

likely result of an earthquake required expensive engineering

consultants, laborious hand calculations, and piecemeal use of

computers.

In the 7 years since FEMA published the prototype earthquake

edition HAZUS97, HAZUS has helped communities across the

United States identify and plan for earthquakes by giving

them access, free of charge, to specialized databases and GISbased analytic tools. Planning with HAZUS can save lives,

property, and tax dollars.

HAZUS-MH (HAZUS Multihazard) for earthquakes

streamlines modeling by merging up-to-date natural hazards

engineering and science with ESRI’s powerful geographic

33

PEER is working in collaboration with CALTRANS and FHWA to investigate

bridge performance and its inter-relationships to highway network performance

needs for post-earthquake emergency response and recovery.
information system, ArcGIS. Users can estimate damage and

other earthquake effects and then map, display, and manage

the results. Interoperability with other software is aided by

the use of standard third-party platforms, editable national

databases, and access to external data and the capabilities of

other models.

With the completion of HAZUS-MH in February 2004, FEMA

has improved seismic hazard identification and risk

assessment methods with the implementation of the fifth

version of its nationally applicable earthquake hazard model.

HAZUS-MH supports the latest revision of the original

earthquake tool plus integrated multihazard analysis with new

flood and hurricane damage models. A third-party integration

option gives operational access to other natural and manmade hazard models. HAZUS-MH maintains two data

management tools designed to help users incorporate their

own detailed, site-specific data for more precise results:

• Building Inventory Tool (BIT) for tax assessor data.

• Inventory Collection and Survey Tool (InCAST) for

building data.

The updated Earthquake Model continues to enable better

collaboration among federal, state and local agencies, and the

private sector.

• HAZUS-MH is supporting state and local agencies in

implementing programs for Pre-Disaster Mitigation under

the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000.

• HAZUS-MH is supporting a congressionally mandated

program to determine the benefits of mitigation.

• Twenty user groups consisting of public and private

sector HAZUS users have been formed in cities, such as

Los Angeles and San Francisco, to discuss uses and

applications of HAZUS and to pool resources and data to

identify and carry out specific projects.

• Twice the number of emergency managers has been

trained to use HAZUS-MH than were trained in the 6

years following the release of HAZUS97.

• The number of new users implementing HAZUS-MH is

expected to rise dramatically with the expansion of

capability from earthquake-only to earthquake, hurricane,

flood, and third-party software modeling.

HAZUS-MH’s latest earthquake software incorporates over 20

databases including Census Bureau demographics and other

federal resources.To refine and improve results, HAZUS can

readily import site-specific soils, liquefaction, building, and

population data from several common formats. HAZUS-MH’s

data management system is designed to permit future

operation from the Internet.

The Earthquake Model provides estimates of damage to

property, hospitals, fire and police stations, schools, bridges

and other transportation facilities, and utilities. Ground

motion and ground failure information is used to calculate

earthquake damage.The model also addresses building debris

generation, fires that occur after earthquakes, casualties,

shelter requirements, and economic losses.The Earthquake

Model includes the Advanced Engineering Building Module

for analysis of earthquake resistant construction in individual

and groups of buildings.

A sixth edition of the HAZUS Earthquake Model, which will

be released as part of HAZUS-MH MR1, will feature faster

runtimes for supporting rapid loss estimation during

earthquake response operations, a capability to add specialized

local building types to the earthquake analysis, updated thirdparty software platforms, and numerous improvements based

on user input.

HAZUS-MH for earthquake analysis is available on a

combination of CD-ROMs and DVDs from the FEMA website

at www.fema.gov/hazus. From here, technical and software

user manuals are available for viewing or downloading.

Technical support for HAZUS users is provided on-line, via

telephone and fax, and through FEMA-sponsored training.

HAZUS-MH MR1 availability will be streamlined to a set of

DVDs.

The FEMA Region VII Earthquake Program continues

partnering with Missouri SEMA to reduce seismic

vulnerability of facilities and systems. FEMA Region VII staff

held the kickoff meeting of the Heartland HAZUS Users

Group in May 2004. Staff also partnered with the University

of Missouri-Rolla (UMR) Hazard Mitigation Institute and the

UMR School of Engineering to provide HAZUS-MH training

to a class of 30 students from businesses, federal, state and

local agencies, and UMR. Regional staff promoted earthquake

safety and the use of HAZUS through various exhibits and

presentations, including the 2003 Annual Conference of the

Association of State Flood Plain Managers in St. Louis.

Regional staff also serves on the Advisory Committee for the

USGS St. Louis Urban Seismic Mapping Project.

U.S. Geological Survey

USGS national seismic hazard maps are used to develop new,

unified building codes for the United States.The maps

integrate geologic mapping, fault locations, fault slip rates,

and earthquake recurrence intervals, and analyses of crustal

deformation, ground-motion patterns, and recent seismicity.

These maps are in digital format and provide, as a function of

latitude and longitude, the maximum severity of ground34
shaking (in terms of horizontal acceleration) that can be

expected during exposure periods of 50, 100, and 250 years.

The maps serve as the basis for applying the seismic design

criteria contained in the building codes, and the maps and

their associated databases are also being used to predict

earthquake losses and to define insurance risks.This

earthquake hazard mapping effort includes Hawaii, Puerto

Rico, the U.S.Virgin Islands, American Samoa, and Guam.

Periodic review and updating of the seismic hazard maps to

incorporate new information are among the highest priorities

for the USGS.The USGS works closely with earthquake

researchers, engineers, and state and local government

representatives across the United States to ensure that the base

geologic data represent the most current and accurate

information available.

The USGS National Hazard Maps are the federal and industry

standard used throughout the country for Building Seismic

Design Codes, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

requirements, insurance-loss estimation, and hazards

assessment and emergency-response planning by FEMA.

Updated and revised maps were published in FY 2002.

Review and updating of the maps by USGS benefited from

the participation of many state and federal agencies as well as

the private sector.The FY 2002 revision took into account a

wide range of recent research results related to past

earthquakes in various regions of the United States and related

urban centers, including the Pacific Northwest (Seattle),

southern California (Los Angeles), central California (San

Francisco-Oakland), the Western States (Las Vegas, Salt Lake

City), the Central United States (Memphis, St. Louis), and the

Eastern United States (Boston, Charleston). USGS has begun

planning the process for the next periodic map update in

2008.

A component of the seismic hazard assessment effort is the

preparation of design maps for use in model building codes.

The USGS seismic hazard maps are incorporated into the

NEHRP Recommended Provisions, which serve as the resource

documents for the IBC and the IRC.The IBC and IRC have

largely replaced regional-based codes in the United States, and

will be subject to periodic updates every 3 years. As part of

the design map effort, USGS researchers released a CD-ROM

that allows designers to easily locate pertinent seismic map

design parameters; this single source for all design

information represents a significant timesaving for designers.

The model code groups include the CD with all copies of the

code document that are sold.

The national-scale earthquake hazards maps cannot take into

account variations in the amplitude and duration of seismic

shaking caused by local geologic structures and soil

conditions.The USGS generates products that address the

specific hazards in high- to moderate-risk urban areas, such as

the San Francisco Bay area and Los Angeles, California; Seattle,

Washington; Salt Lake City, Utah; Memphis,Tennessee; and

Charleston, South Carolina. Earthquake shaking scenarios are

being developed for public planning, and modeling of

ground motion is being provided for engineering

applications. In conjunction with these products, the USGS

conducts workshops to ensure the proper transfer of

knowledge and to help design effective mitigation.

The Memphis area is part of the NMSZ, an area of frequent

earthquakes that stretches along the lower Mississippi Valley

just west of Memphis,Tennessee, into southern Illinois. More

earthquakes occur in this zone than any other part of the

United States east of the Rockies.The USGS and the Center for

Earthquake Research and Information (CERI) at the University

of Memphis updated probabilities of earthquakes in the

NMSZ.The new estimate is that there is a 7 to 10 percent

chance, in the next 50 years, of a major earthquake similar to

the series of several magnitude 7 to 8 events that occurred in

1811-1812, and a 25 to 40 percent chance of a magnitude

6.0 or greater earthquake. A suite of detailed hazard maps for

Memphis and Shelby County,Tennessee, were completed in

FY 2003.These include new 1:24,000-scale geologic maps

for Memphis; a map of seismic wave amplification potential

that demonstrates the enhancement of seismic shaking near

the Mississippi River; and a 3-D model of the sedimentary

structure and shear wave velocity of rocks and soils

underlying the city, used to predict the path of seismic waves.

Together with Georgia Tech, the USGS developed a new

methodology for calculating the potential for soil liquefaction

during strong shaking and applying the method in maps for

the Memphis and Shelby County areas. In a dramatic phase of

35

Debris generated from a HAZUS simulated earthquake scenario.
the work, large blasts were detonated deep within sediments

along the Mississippi River to simulate an earthquake, helping

scientists to understand how seismic “waves” move through

the deep sand and clay layers of sediment that are

characteristic of the region. In this experiment, USGS

scientists used newly-installed strong motion seismographs,

part of the ANSS, to record the explosions and learn more

about how buildings and other infrastructure are affected by

ground shaking. Builders, developers, and the insurance

industry can factor this kind of earthquake shaking

information into how and where buildings are built and how

building codes and zoning regulations are developed. Earth

scientists and engineers will use the information to study

seismic wave propagation and soil amplification, to estimate

earthquake hazard, and to develop safer structures.

Extending back into the 17th century, there is a record of

earthquakes striking various locations in the central United

States. In FY 2001, the USGS published a new full-color wall

poster map of the central United States showing all of the

historic earthquakes recorded or otherwise known to have

occurred in the region since 1699.The map area includes the

well-known NMSZ.The poster map (USGS Geologic

Investigations Series I-2812) is an important educational tool

for the population in the region and also serves as a planning

document for agencies such as the CUSEC and FEMA for

promoting earthquake preparedness.

USGS recently unveiled an up-to-date and comprehensive

nationwide compilation of information on known or

suspected active faults. Accessible via a user-friendly Web

interface at: http://Qfaults.cr.usgs.gov/, the database

summarizes geologic, geomorphic, and geographic data for

about 2,000 faults in the United States that are believed to be

sources of earthquakes greater than magnitude 6 and having

documented activity during the past 1.6 million years. Much

of the information is based on paleoseismology, which is the

geologic study of prehistoric earthquakes. Paleoseismology

combines geologic tools such as trenching with

archeological-style analysis to determine the times and sizes

of ancient earthquakes in the Quaternary Period.The database

is designed to fulfill the needs of a broad group of users,

ranging from the science community to the general public.

The seismic hazard assessment community will benefit from

public access to all data available on potential earthquake

sources in one location.The database will allow these users to

identify faults that have likely produced strong ground

motion in the geologically recent past and that may

contribute to future seismic hazards. Other potential users

include the earthquake-engineering community, the insurance

industry, and companies managing large infrastructures, such

as pipelines or power-transmission networks. In addition,

state and local planners can use the database to locate

potential earthquake sources on maps. Similarly, emergency

response officials can use the database to plan earthquake

drills and to identify and fortify critical infrastructure near

active faults. Finally, the general public is becoming

increasingly aware of potential hazards in their environment.

The USGS, as well as State Geological Surveys, frequently are

called upon to respond to questions regarding the location of

hazardous faults that may impact the lives of the population at

large.

Regional Consortia

Cascadia Region Earthquake Workgroup

For the Cascadia Scenario Project, CREW Board members are

working jointly with the Oregon DOGAMI to prepare a

document describing the seismic risks facing the Cascadia

Region.This is a follow-up to the HAZUS working group

products completed last year.The CREW leadership also

attended a HAZUS training program held at FEMA’s EMI and

supported the Washington State HAZUS Users Group.

Central United States Earthquake Consortium

The Association of CUSEC State Geologists has continued to

look at ways to improve seismic hazard identification and risk

assessment methods and their use.Working in collaboration

with other CUSEC partners, the Association has developed a

mapping partnership that includes the USGS-Mid America

Mapping Center, the CUSEC State Transportation Task Force,

and the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program. Efforts have

consisted of collection of shear wave data for the purpose of

revising the Borcherdt Soils Classification. In support of this

effort, workshops were held to demonstrate the benefits of

using geoscience products at the community level.

CUSEC also sponsored field trips during this period to

observe field work by the USGS in collecting shear wave

information throughout the central United States.The field

trips provided an opportunity for researchers and nonresearchers to discuss the importance of this type of work and

how it can be used.The interaction has resulted in the pursuit

of additional field investigations in other areas of the central

United States.

During this period, new seismic recording instruments were

installed in New Harmony, Indiana, further enhancing the

limited seismic network in the central United States.

One of the most promising tools for identifying and

ultimately improving the region’s seismic risk is HAZUS.

Participants at introductory workshops represented local and

state government, as well as university students.

To improve the understanding of earthquakes and their

effects, CUSEC offered a number of workshops specifically

focused on the earthquake hazard and its associated risk.The

36
understanding of the earthquake risk is directly tied to the

understanding of the hazard in the central United States.The

low recurrence intervals of seismic events, and the longer

return periods between them, contributes to a lack of

understanding.Working with the USGS, the Association of

CUSEC State Geologists has provided basic Earthquake 101

workshops to increase the level of understanding not only for

those who are responsible for the community’s safety, but also

for those who can be champions for the cause.

A considerable amount of work has also gone into preparing

for the next damaging event so that valuable information is

not lost.The coordination of the research response is an

essential element in this effort. It is also important that the

collection of this information does not interrupt the

emergency response that would take place.To address these

issues, CUSEC organized a committee to assist in the

development of a research coordination plan.The Post

Earthquake Technical Clearinghouse Plan will help assure a

smooth co-existence between the research and emergency

response efforts.

Northeast States Emergency Consortium

NESEC established a HAZUS-MH and GIS Assistance and

Coordination Center within its existing office in Wakefield,

Massachusetts. NESEC’s priority is to provide direct support to

those Northeast State Emergency Management Agencies that

presently do not have the resources and staff to develop an inhouse GIS and HAZUS-MH capability.

Selected State, Territorial, And Local Accomplishments

Alaska

Alaska is using VRISKMap® software to facilitate risk and

vulnerability analysis from earthquake and other natural

hazards. The software allows Mitigation Staff to overlay

hazard maps, delineate by degree of hazard, and run queries

giving population and infrastructure associated information to

determine potential impact and estimated losses. Alaska is

currently assisting its largest communities and boroughs with

developing Local All-Hazard Mitigation Plans to fulfill the

Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000 criteria. These plans are

essential for identifying the risks, vulnerabilities, and the

economic impact to the State’s population and infrastructure

from natural hazards, such as Alaska’s extensive earthquake

hazard. These plans cover approximately 83 percent of

Alaska’s population. Mitigation Plans will soon be

coordinated with a web-based interface using

MitigationPlan.com® software to facilitate associating local

hazard mitigation plans, hazard data, strategies, goals, and

initiatives with the State Plan.

Arkansas

Arkansas has trained several local coordinators and economic

development districts on planning for disasters, developing

risk assessments, and identifying their hazards. Currently,

Arkansas and several of its counties are using HAZUS to run

risk assessments and to help develop their local hazard

mitigation plans.

California

OES Earthquake Program staff continues to serve on the

HAZUS Earthquake committee and as beta testers for the

earthquake module of HAZUS-MH. Staff performs benchmark

evaluations of beta versions before formal release by FEMA.

HAZUS continues to be used extensively by OES GIS staff in

northern and southern California in the development of

planning scenarios for state agencies and local governments.

OES uses both HAZUS generated ground motions as well as

ShakeMap ground motion maps to generate earthquake loss

estimates. Staff also continues to participate in the HAZUS

Users Groups in the Bay Area and southern California and

with the ESRI HAZUS Users.

OES used HAZUS to provide initial assessments of damage in

the San Simeon earthquake (December 22, 2003) and for the

Parkfield earthquake in 2004. In both earthquakes, HAZUS

estimates with ShakeMap input were used to assist state and

local agencies and FEMA in determining response priorities.

Hawaii

HSEAC successfully implemented the HAZUS Earthquake Loss

Estimation Methodology using a newly constructed Building

Inventory Database for Hawaii and Maui Counties that yield

more accurate damage results. Moreover, during a destructive

Hawaii earthquake event, the Pacific Disaster Center (PDC)

will generate a HAZUS report and construct a power point

graphics briefing within 60 minutes after earthquake origin

time for critical decision-making by the Hawaii Emergency

Management community.

HSEAC and the PDC developed a HAZUS Atlas of 20 credible

earthquake damage scenarios for use in community planning

in mitigation, preparedness, and emergency response and

recovery.

Idaho

The Bureau of Disaster Services and Idaho Geological Survey

are working with network operators, end-users, and

representatives of USGS to develop a plan to implement the

ANSS in the state and to resuscitate failing networks.The plan

is available at the Bureau of Disaster Services website,

http://www2.state.id.us/bdsmitigation/resources_doc.html#.

37
Urban geologic hazard mapping is a high priority in Idaho.

The Idaho Geological Survey has completed updated versions

of the Idaho fault map, posted on the Survey’s website

(http://www.idahogeology.org/Services/GeologicHazards/

default.htm).The Survey also completed quaternary maps in

northern, western, and central Idaho that address landslide

and faulting hazards.

Missouri

SEMA continues to partner with the Missouri DNR to address

earthquake geologic issues and provide support to the Seismic

Safety Commission. DNR collects, interprets, and provides

geologic information, maps, and reports regarding the

potential for geologic hazards, including earthquakes,

landslides, and sinkhole collapses. DNR also continues

mapping Missouri’s geologically seismic areas, an effort

initiated with NEHRP seed money provided by FEMA and the

USGS.

New Jersey

The New Jersey earthquake hazard reduction program

emphasis during FY 2003-2004 has been a continuing effort

to populate the HAZUS loss estimation model in concert with

New York State and New York City through a cooperative,

multi-agency organization known as NYCEM (New York Area

Consortium for Earthquake Loss Mitigation). Under this

multi-year program, data for counties radiating outward from

the New York metropolitan area has been developed and

integrated into the HAZUS model.

New Jersey data for HAZUS is provided by two organizations

under contract from the New Jersey Office of Emergency

Management.The New Jersey Geological Survey (NJGS)

provides geological and earthquake history data. During

2003-2004, the NJGS completed geologic databases for

Middlesex County and Passaic County. An engineering

consulting firm provided structural and census information in

2003-2004 and completed studies for Morris, Middlesex, and

Passaic Counties.

Middlesex County

Geologic, topographic, and test-boring data were acquired

and analyzed to map seismic soil class, liquefaction

susceptibility, and landslide susceptibility for Middlesex

County.The soil class, liquefaction susceptibility, and landslide

susceptibility data were entered into the HAZUS model for

each census tract in the county.The HAZUS model was run

with the full upgraded geologic data and with the default

geologic data for earthquake magnitudes of 5.5 and 6.To

assess the effect of liquefaction, runs were also made with full

upgraded geology and with upgrade without liquefaction for

magnitudes 5, 5.5, 6, 6.5, and 7.The upgraded geology

changed both the spatial distribution of damage and the total

damage estimates compared to default geology.The upgraded

geology produced greater building damage in the lower

Raritan River valley and Arthur Kill areas of the county, where

salt-marsh soils are softer and more liquefiable than the

default, and less building damage in most other areas, where

till, weathered-bedrock soils, and Cretaceous clay and sand are

stronger than the default. Because most soils in the county are

stronger than the default, the total economic loss is between

10 and 20 percent less with the upgraded geologic data than

with the default data at all magnitudes. Adding liquefaction

38

Earthquake Loss Estimation using HAZUS.
increases building damage about 10 percent in susceptible

census tracts, especially at magnitudes less than 7, but results

in less than a 5 percent increase in total loss for the entire

county.This is a minimum value because the model does not

calculate damage to roads, railways, and underground utilities

caused by liquefaction. Structures particularly susceptible to

damage from permanent ground displacement, such as

pipelines and bridges, show significantly increased breakage

when liquefaction is added.

In addition to the HAZUS data upgrades and runs, shear-wave

velocity was measured on four soil types (Cretaceous clay,

Cretaceous sand, Pensauken Formation sand and gravel, and

stream-terrace sand) at a total of 12 locations.These

measurements were made to check the soil-class assignments,

which use test-drilling data as a proxy for shear-wave velocity.

The measured velocities generally confirmed the assignments.

Weathering reduces velocities in the near-surface parts of

Cretaceous sand and clay, an effect previously observed in till

in glaciated terrain.

Passaic County

Geologic, topographic, and test-boring data were acquired

and analyzed to map seismic soil class, liquefaction

susceptibility, and landslide susceptibility for Passaic County.

The soil class, liquefaction susceptibility, and landslide

susceptibility data were entered into the HAZUS model for

each census tract in the county.The HAZUS model was run

with the full upgraded geologic data and with the default

geologic data for earthquake magnitudes of 5.5 and 6.To

assess the effect of landslides, runs were also made with full

upgraded geology and with upgraded geology without

landslide hazard for magnitudes 5.5, 6, and 7.The upgraded

geology changed both the spatial distribution of damage and

the total damage estimates compared to default geology. The

upgraded geology produced greater building damage in the

Pompton River valley, Preakness Valley, and parts of the Passaic

River valley, where glacial-lake and alluvial soils are more

liquefiable than the default, and less building damage in most

other areas, where till, bedrock, and glacial gravel are stronger

than the default and have low liquefaction susceptibility.

In addition to the HAZUS data upgrades and runs, shear-wave

velocity was measured on four soil types (alluvium, glacial

sand, glacial gravel, and till) at 12 locations.These

measurements were made to check the soil-class assignments,

which use test-drilling data as a proxy for shear-wave velocity.

The measured velocities confirmed the assignments.

Over the past 2 years, three studies were performed using the

soil information and geologic data to forecast the losses that

Morris, Passaic, and Middlesex Counties could suffer after an

earthquake.These studies describe the scale and extent of

damage and disruption that may result from potential

earthquakes in these counties and compliment current and

past earthquake loss-estimation work in Bergen, Essex,

Hudson, and Union Counties, as well as the greater NY-CT-NJ

Metropolitan Region. An improved building inventory for the

counties was established for implementation in HAZUS.The

infrastructure represents a combined 1.1 billion square feet,

and a total replacement value of $73.1 billion. Almost

543,000 households are in these counties, representing a total

population of 1.7 million.

New York

A preliminary forecast of the type of losses that the New York

City area could suffer after an earthquake is the subject of a

study funded by FEMA Region II and coordinated by MCEER.

The initial stages of this study involved fact-finding and

assessment, with the development of preliminary soil maps

and building inventories.The primary objective of this study

was to carry out an initial risk characterization for Manhattan

below 59th Street.The report documents the findings of a

preliminary study focusing on seismic risks in the New York

City area.

The tasks of this study were to:

• Become familiar with earthquake loss estimation

methodologies and HAZUS.

• Perform HAZUS scenario runs in the New York City area

using default soil and building information supplied by

the HAZUS code.

• Perform HAZUS scenario runs using two representative

census tracts in Manhattan to examine the sensitivity of

loss estimation to different soil conditions and different

building inventories.

The preliminary results of the research indicate:

• Dramatic differences in total loss estimates between runs

done with default values and runs done with improved

estimates of soil conditions and building inventories.

• Differences are more dramatic for smaller magnitude

events.

• Total loss estimates in the modified runs can differ

significantly with those of the default (by more than a

factor of 10).

• The effect of switching to better estimates of building

inventory can be as important as the effect of switching

to better estimates of soil conditions.

• Parts of New York City have the unique characteristic of a

considerable percentage of tall buildings.

39
• It is of paramount importance to establish better

estimates for soil conditions and building inventory for

the entire New York City area.

During the last 2 years, work refining the research to develop

a more accurate loss estimate was undertaken.This included:

• Providing better data for building age, type, quality,

height, square footage, and seismic design level, and

performing sensitivity analyses to determine their relative

importance.

• Upgrading soil and building inventory information for

the entire New York City area.

• Developing and upgrading more accurate fragility curves

for the type of buildings unique to the New York City

area.

The goal of this loss estimation project is provide a

framework for businesses and agencies to take mitigation

actions to reduce potential damage and losses from an

earthquake.

The New York State Emergency Management Office has been

an active user of HAZUS since it was first introduced by

FEMA in 1994. Major efforts have included collaboration with

the NYCEM study of the New York metro area; spearheading

efforts with the New York State Geological Survey in shear

wave velocity testing of the state’s surficial geology, leading to

the development of county level HAZUS ready soil site

classification maps; a HAZUS validation study based on a

comparison of observed versus modeled losses from the

Ausable Forks, New York earthquake; incorporation of

HAZUS-based risk assessments into the State Hazard

Mitigation Plan; and assisting New York City Office of

Emergency Management in adopting and using HAZUS.

Vermont

For the first prototype of a pre-disaster mitigation plan in

Vermont, the Vermont Geological Survey ran a number of

HAZUS-MH scenarios to predict earthquake damage in

Addison County. The earthquake estimation and loss data

were transferred to plans that will be adopted by towns as

preparation for earthquake events.The State of Vermont

recently submitted to FEMA the Draft State Hazard Mitigation

Plan. The Vermont Geological Survey supplied HAZUS-MH

information for the plan based on postulated events in and

around Vermont. HAZUS-MH was used for the critical portion

of the plan to indicate risk, vulnerability, and estimating

losses.

Washington

The State of Washington produced reconnaissance NEHRP site

class maps and liquefaction susceptibility maps for every

county in the state. Detailed maps were prepared for select

cities.The project was funded by an HMGP grant awarded

after the February 2001 Nisqually earthquake.The maps

support state IBC/IRC implementation and are used in

mitigation and preparedness planning at the state and local

level.

In partnership with the NTHMP and the NOAA Center for

TIME,Washington produced tsunami hazard maps for Seattle,

Whidbey Island, Bellingham, and Anacortes.The maps are

used in land use planning at the state, county, and community

level, and in response-planning activities at state and local

level.

Washington continued the collaborated effort with FEMA and

FEMA Region X to teach HAZUS locally to the public and

private sector.The HAZUS course has been updated to teach

HAZUS-MH and is followed up with one-on-one training

within the local jurisdiction to ensure that HAZUS is correctly

loaded and used. A Washington HAZUS Users Group (HUG)

meets monthly and works with various jurisdictions/private

entities on HAZUS issues and better data sharing among all

40

Generated by HAZUS, this map describes the distribution of soil/rock types

across the island, with higher elevations in uptown Manhattan on stiff

rock/soil (Class B), intermediate type C in Midtown, and softsoil (Class D) in

lower Manhattan, along the identified fault zones in Upper Manhattan and in

low-lying, coastal areas.
state HAZUS users.The course allows students to deal with

local issues and focuses on a multi-disciplinary approach to

using HAZUS for hazard mitigation. HAZUS training is more

accessible to the local communities and provides the

opportunity for the emergency manager and others to take

HAZUS directly to local officials and community groups.

The City of Seattle completed a HAZUS Pilot Project on

designated schools.The project used HAZUS-MH to support

emergency response plans for schools in the Seattle Public

School District. It emphasized the seismic vulnerabilities of

school facilities, nearby bridges, and other resources upon

which the schools would depend in an emergency. Using

HAZUS-MH, each “Hazard Impact Area” was analyzed based

on several earthquake scenarios to produce damage estimates

that will later be used to support mitigation and preparation

planning.The project also produced two maps for each

participating school showing resources in their area.The goal

is to develop a template that school districts in Washington

can use to assess their school structures and develop

appropriate mitigation and preparedness plans.

Other Organizations

Earthquake Engineering Research Institute

In 2003, the University of California, Berkeley EERI Student

chapter, together with leading practicing engineers in EERI,

partnered with the City of Berkeley to conduct a walkabout,

to help city officials identify and inventory seismically

vulnerable multi-unit, soft story buildings in their

community.The students were excited to put their academic

knowledge to such practical use and further reinforced their

decision to make earthquake engineering a career.

Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering

Research

For the past several years, MCEER has been developing, under

the sponsorship of the FHWA, a new methodology for

deterministic and probabilistic seismic risk analysis of

highway systems nationwide. MCEER has recently

implemented this new methodology into a public-domain

software package named REDARS (Risks from Earthquake

Damage to Roadway Systems).

This software has since become an important tool in enabling

research collaboration between the three EERCs. For example,

CALTRANS has initiated a trial study to apply REDARS to a

region of the Bay Area Highway Network.While CALTRANS

funding for this project is from outside the three EERCs, the

PEER Center and MCEER-FHWA are providing input to the

project. MCEER-FHWA is providing technical support for a

more user-friendly demonstration version of REDARS. PEER is

sharing data sets developed previously in its own Highway

Demonstration Project of the Bay Area and is interested in

cooperating on the implementation of enhanced bridge

performance models and hazard modules in REDARS.The

MAE Center also is exploring whether REDARS could

potentially be used for a small region, e.g., Memphis, to serve

as a validation/calibration to the more global loss modeling

work by MAE researchers. Facilities and modules in REDARS

that are amenable to implementation within the MAE Center

Visualization module MAEVIZ are also being considered as

part of this tri-center collaboration.

MCEER has produced seismic risk analysis software called

REDARS 1.0 that will allow transportation asset owners to

perform network analysis for pre-event planning and postevent response. A validation study was successfully completed

using historical data in the Los Angeles metropolitan area and

in June 2003, MCEER hosted a researcher and user workshop

to verify the direction of product development being done to

produce REDARS 2.0. Completed work consists of (a)

41

Tsunami hazard map of Seattle.
developing a public-domain version of software (REDARS

2.0) that will be based on the seismic risk analysis

methodology; (b) expanding various technical features of the

hazards and component modules of this software; (c)

programming new variance-reduction and decision-guidance

that will substantially reduce the number of scenario

earthquakes and simulations needed to achieve given

confidence levels and limits for probabilistic applications of

the REDARS methodology for seismic risk analysis of highway

systems; and (d) documentation of alternative approaches for

representing relative costs and risks of various highway

system seismic risk reduction options that may be evaluated

in future applications of REDARS.

MCEER also is developing fragility curves for seismically

retrofitted bridges and effects on transportation network

performance.

Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center

Soil-structure interaction is where energy and motion are

transferred from the soil to a structure or building.This is an

area of complex activity during earthquakes. By developing

tools to reduce the uncertainty in models for soils structure

interaction, engineers can better understand the performance

of foundation elements, buildings, and structures during

earthquakes.The PEER center is creating tools for computing

soil structure interaction using the OpenSees platform.

A major Lifelines Program project kicked off by the PEER

Center is the Next Generation of Attenuation Project.This

project is made up of many individual projects in the PEER

Lifelines program. It is anticipated that the updated

attenuation relations will lower uncertainty levels compared to

the current versions, thereby potentially driving down the

cost of future structures.The project will also develop new

computer models describing how soil or geologic structure

can increase ground motion under certain conditions.This

effort uses personnel from the PEER Center universities,

consultants, the USGS, the California Geological Survey, the

California Department of Transportation, and the SCEC.

Recognizing the need to improve access to earthquake ground

motion data, PEER embarked on an effort to create a webbased, searchable database of strong ground motion data.The

first step was to gather the most important records from

around the world.The next step was to ensure that all the data

had been processed consistently and reliably.The third step

was to gather related information, such as earthquake

magnitude, distance, site conditions, and other relevant

engineering parameters. Finally, PEER created the online

database to make all the information available. In its

completed form, the PEER Strong Motion Database brings

together over 1,500 strong ground motion records from 143

different earthquakes in a web-accessible format.

NEHRP Accomplishments:

Goal D

Activities under Goal D comprise the basic research

component of the NEHRP and cover a range of disciplines

from geology to seismology, to earthquake engineering and

structural engineering, to the behavioral and economic

sciences. NSF and USGS are the two primary NEHRP agencies

supporting Goal D, with USGS emphasizing geologic and

seismologic disciplines and NSF supporting these areas, in

addition to studies of the built environment and the

behavioral and economic impact of earthquakes.

Goal D: Improve the understanding of earthquakes

and their effects and consequences

1: Improve monitoring of earthquakes and earthquakegenerating processes.

2: Improve understanding of earthquake occurrence and

potential.

3: Improve earthquake hazards assessments and develop

earthquake-potential estimates as planning scenarios.

4: Improve fundamental knowledge of earthquake effects.

5: Advance earthquake engineering knowledge of the built

environment.

6: Advance understanding of the social and economic

implications of earthquakes.

The NEHRP Agencies

National Science Foundation

The NSF created and continues to fund the George E. Brown,

Jr. NEES, a major national infrastructure project to create a

complete system of test facilities that will revolutionize

earthquake engineering research.The project was initiated by

NSF and the earthquake engineering community in response

to a congressional mandate (NEHRP Reauthorization Act of

1994) to take stock of the Nation’s experimental and testing

capabilities in earthquake engineering.

NEES will operate from October 1, 2004, through September

30, 2014, and will be managed by the nonprofit NEES

Consortium, Inc., which will allocate research time at

equipment sites; lead training, education, and outreach

activities; and establish ties with U.S. and international

partners.The NEES will upgrade, modernize, expand, and

network major facilities, including:

42
• Shake tables used for earthquake simulations

• Geotechnical centrifuges for testing soils/foundations

under earthquake loading

• Tsunami wave basin for earthquake simulations

• Large-scale experimentation systems, e.g., reaction wall

and modular simulation equipment

• Field monitoring and testing facilities

The NEES is using ultra-high-speed Internet2 technology to

link 15 nationally distributed earthquake research facilities.

NEES’ collaborative and integrated experimentation,

computation, theory, databases, and model-based simulation

will improve the seismic design and performance of U.S. civil

and mechanical infrastructure systems.The NEES network

provides interoperability, resource sharing, scalable, and

efficient net-wide deployment, open-system standardization,

database consistency and integrity, and modularity in both

software and hardware architectures.

NEES will lead to a new era of collaboration in earthquake

engineering research.Teams of experts in the United States

and around the world will have the unprecedented

opportunity to jointly plan, conduct, and analyze the results

of experiments and models. Easy access to the Network’s

resources will facilitate broad participation-both informally

and through official partnerships-by many communities of

users, including researchers, educators, students, engineers,

government agencies, professional organizations, industry, and

disaster preparedness and response teams. Individuals and

teams can take part in NEES activities onsite or at remote

locations and can participate in different kinds of research,

from individual and small group studies to “grand challenge”

projects in which teams from different institutions and

organizations pursue a comprehensive systems approach to a

specific, broad-based earthquake engineering problem.

To help guide NEES through the next decade, a panel

organized by the National Research Council (NRC) of the

National Academies has developed a long-term research

agenda for the earthquake engineering research community.

This plan identifies important research needs that are well

suited to investigate techniques involving NEES equipment

sites and resources, especially with regard to the integrated

research approach that the Network embodies. NEES research

will provide the foundation for the development of new

technologies in critical areas such as:

• High-performance materials used to strengthen

buildings, bridges, soils, and critical lifelines;

• Performance-based engineering involving codes and

decisions related to seismic risk, new designs, and

retrofitting

• Structural controls to protect buildings, bridges, and

other structures

• Monitoring tools and sensors to conduct rapid postearthquake condition assessment of the built environment

• Advanced warning systems to protect coastal regions

from earthquake-generated tsunamis

• In situ evaluation and remediation to improve and stabilize

soil response during earthquakes

• Improved techniques to protect critical lifelines such as

above- and below-ground fuel, water, and sewer pipelines

and electrical, communication, and transit systems during

earthquakes

• Improved simulation tools for analyzing more complete

and comprehensive models of seismic performance

• Methods to improve decision making with regard to

planning and evacuation, emergency response, and postearthquake recovery

NEES ushers in a new generation of earthquake engineering

research. Enhanced understanding of earthquakes and seismic

performance made possible by the Network’s people, ideas,

and tools will lead to innovative, cost-effective measures for

better protecting the vast network of facilities and services on

which everyone depends.

U.S. Geological Survey

The USGS has the federal responsibility for monitoring and

notification of seismic activity in the United States.The USGS

fulfills this role by operating the U.S. National Seismograph

Network (USNSN), the National Earthquake Information

Center (NEIC), and the National Strong Motion Program

(NSMP), and by supporting 16 regional networks in areas of

moderate-to-high seismic activity. All of these efforts are 

43

A tsunami wave basin.
coordinated under the ANSS, http://www.anss.org/.The

USGS also supports geodetic monitoring systems that measure

the static deformation of the Earth’s crust due to earthquakes

and earthquake-generating processes.The geodetic

monitoring is done with high-precision, land-based

surveying techniques and the satellite-based GPS. Data derived

from these monitoring systems are used to identify seismic

hazards and, following an earthquake, to rapidly characterize

the probable size and extent of damage, assess the continuing

risks from aftershocks and related ground-motion and

ground-failure hazards, and facilitate the work of response

officials.

The USGS and cooperating universities operate regional

seismic networks in areas of high seismicity. Data from all U.S.

seismic networks are used to monitor active tectonic

structures in much greater detail than is possible with the

national scale network. Each region has a local data center

where the data are processed and regional catalogues of

earthquakes are produced.These data centers serve as local

distribution points for transmitting information about

earthquakes to the public, local and state agencies, and other

regional interests.The regional data centers relay earthquake

data in real time to the NEIC as well as to other regional

networks. Data centers also provide information about

regional earthquake hazards and accepted mitigation

practices, and those data centers located at universities provide

training and research facilities for students.

Conventional seismometers used in earthquake monitoring

networks cannot accurately record strong ground and

building motions caused by large, nearby earthquakes; yet

these technical data are extremely valuable for the design of

earthquake-resistant buildings and other structures.Through

the NSMP, the USGS maintains about 840 strong motion

recorders in 35 states and territories.The strong motion data

show the amplitude, frequency content, and duration of

strong accelerations caused by an earthquake.These

parameters are direct inputs to computer models and scale

models of structures to test their performance under realistic

earthquake shaking.

Geodetic networks provide essential information about

movement of the land surface near faults and earthquake

source zones.The USGS is working with universities and local

agencies to conduct geodetic investigations using GPS and

laser-ranging surveys. A dense network of continuous GPS

stations is being installed in southern California in

cooperation with the National Aeronautics and Space

Administration (NASA), NSF, and Scripps University to

determine the distribution of long-term crustal deformation

and the spatial and temporal variations of the strain field.

During the next year, with funding support from USGS 

cooperators, new stations will be sited and installed,

communications and data retrieval operations will be

developed, and processing and archiving centers will be

established.The USGS has a lead role in the operation of the

network, with responsibility to maintain stations and

download and interpret the data. In addition, the USGS is

investigating a new satellite technology, Interferometric

Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR), that has the potential of

quickly and accurately providing large aerial maps of pre- and

post-earthquake land deformation.Work is under way to

develop computational tools necessary to efficiently analyze,

interpret, and model InSAR data.The InSAR results in

southern California will be used to augment, check, and, if

necessary, correct the independent GPS measurements.

In 2000, Congress authorized the upgrade of the seismic

monitoring networks in the United States through the

implementation of the ANSS.The ANSS initiative is being used

to improve the performance and integration of the national

and regional seismic monitoring networks whenever funds

are available.The primary goals are to unify, modernize, and

expand earthquake monitoring equipment and activities in

the United States. Implementation of an ANSS would involve

five basic components: (1) an expanded U.S. National

Seismograph Network; (2) expanded and modernized

regional networks; (3) creation of dense networks of urban

stations capable of monitoring strong motion both on the

ground and in structures; (4) two portable, temporary

seismograph arrays that can be rapidly deployed following an

earthquake; and (5) upgrade and integration of regional and

national recording centers with the capability of

disseminating data and information in real time. An important

emphasis of ANSS is improved monitoring in metropolitan

areas in regions of high-to-moderate seismic risk. In total,

ANSS envisions the addition of 6,000 new seismic

monitoring instruments in over 25 urban centers; 3,000 of

these would be deployed in reference sites, i.e., ground based,

and an additional 3,000 in structures. Implementation of

ANSS would also result in improved integration of existing

networks and the replacement of obsolete equipment at

1,000 stations in regional networks across the Nation.

As part of the expansion and modernization of earthquake

monitoring in the United States that is being carried out

through the development of ANSS, USGS installed 64 seismic

stations in FY 2004, significantly expanding the ANSS and

meeting its Government Performance Results Act (GPRA)

targets and increasing the total number of ANSS urban and

regional monitoring stations. A major accomplishment was

the expansion of the ANSS national seismic “backbone”

network from 53 to 63 stations.This backbone network

provides a nationwide earthquake detection capability of

magnitude 3.5 or better–essentially allowing the rapid 

44
technical characterization of all felt earthquakes.This has been

a major program goal for many years, and its achievement

means that a key performance target of the program’s FiveYear Plan has been met–nearly 4 years ahead of schedule.

ANSS is also working with the NSF to expand the backbone

network to 80 stations. NSF will provide funding in FY 2005-

FY 2006 for 17 new ANSS backbone stations and 8 station

upgrades as part of their EarthScope research initiative. USGS

will install, operate, and maintain the stations as part of ANSS.

The design goal for the ANSS backbone network is 100

stations, with a national earthquake detection capability of

magnitude 3.0.

The ANSS initiative provides comprehensive new data on

earthquake ground-shaking in urban areas. ShakeMap, a

flagship product of the ANSS, is a tool used to rapidly portray

the extent of potentially damaging shaking following an

earthquake. It is generated and served via the Internet within

minutes of the earthquake, and is used primarily for

emergency response, loss estimation, and public information.

ShakeMap coverage areas include urbanized areas of

California, the Seattle-Tacoma metro area, Anchorage, and the

Reno/Las Vegas corridor. Efforts are underway to bring the

system online in the Memphis/New Madrid region as

instrumentation in these areas increases. Maps made

immediately after the 2003 San Simeon (M6.5) and 2004

(M6.0) Parkfield, California earthquakes were used by a

variety of agencies and responders, although the impact of

both earthquakes was relatively low due to their remote

locations.

ShakeCast is a fully automated system designed to deliver

specific ShakeMap products to critical users and trigger

established post-earthquake response protocols. ShakeCast

provides utilities and other large organizations with

instantaneous, hierarchical listings of users’ affected facilities,

notifies users (via pager, cell phone, e-mail) when user-set

thresholds have been exceeded, and automatically initiates

other software systems, e.g., loss estimation, GIS. Currently, the

CALTRANS Bridge Engineering Division and PG&E are testing

the prototype system. CALTRANS has over 25,000 bridges

and overpasses under their responsibility in California and

will use ShakeCast to construct an instantaneous snapshot of

the likely damage to each, thereby allowing them to prioritize

traffic rerouting, closures, and inspections following a

damaging earthquake. In 2005, USGS will be coordinating

with several other large, critical facility agencies to implement

ShakeCast, including the California Department of Water

Resources (Division of Dam Safety),Washington Department

of Transportation,Washington State and the City of Seattle

Emergency Management Divisions, FEMA, and the LADPW.

Deployment of ShakeCast to better use USGS ShakeMaps will

greatly enhance these agencies’ ability to respond to and

recover from earthquakes.

The USGS Community Internet Intensity Map is an automatic

web-based system for rapidly generating seismic intensity

maps based on reports collected from Internet users

immediately following earthquakes.These volunteer reports

are plotted on a map and provide a general, regional picture

of how widely and intensely an earthquake was felt.These

maps also provide important information on regional-to-local

variations in shaking intensity and are particularly valuable in

areas with few seismometers.This system—popularly known

as “Did you feel it?”—has now received over 1/2 million

individual responses in the United States. Based on this

45

Existing and proposed ANSS stations and shaking hazards in the US.
success, the system was recently expanded to work in all areas

of the world. Rather than ZIP codes, international Internet

users simply pick from over 55,000 cities; their local intensity

of shaking gets instantly mapped based on the city location

and is available to all via the Internet.This worked well for a

recent magnitude 5.9 earthquake in Romania, with reports of

shaking coming in from six different countries the day after

the system went online. Further efforts to increase awareness

of the global system will be made in the 2005.The global

maps can be found at http://earthquake.usgs.gov under “Did

You Feel It?’’ by selecting “Outside US.”

The USGS, along with NSF, funds the SCEC, a 40-institution

research consortium headquartered at the University of

Southern California. SCEC was founded in 1991 with a

mission to gather new information about earthquakes in

southern California, integrate this information into a

comprehensive and predictive understanding of earthquake

phenomena, and communicate this understanding to endusers and the general public to increase earthquake awareness,

reduce economic losses, and save lives. Leading scientists from

institutions throughout the country participate in SCEC.To

support this community, SCEC also engages in information

technology research that will revolutionize methods of doing

collaborative research and distributing research products online. In addition, the SCEC Communication, Education, and

Outreach Program offers student research experiences, webbased education tools, classroom curricula, museum displays,

public information brochures, online newsletters, and

technical workshops and publications.

Three notable domestic earthquakes occurred during this

reporting period. USGS scientists studied the short- and longterm effects from the magnitude 7.9 Denali earthquake which

rocked Alaska on November 3, 2002.This was one of the

largest recorded earthquakes in our Nation’s history, causing

countless landslides and road closures, but minimal structural

damage and amazingly few injuries and no deaths.The

remote location of the earthquake helped ensure that it was

not more devastating; however, advanced seismic monitoring

from the USGS and partners, long-term research, and a

commitment to hazard preparedness and mitigation also

played key roles. For example, in the late 1960s and early

1970s, USGS scientists serving on a federal task force were

instrumental in ensuring that the Alaska pipeline was

designed and built to withstand the effects of a magnitude

8.0 earthquake. USGS design guidance proved to be on-target,

and the pipeline suffered little damage.This earthquake is

likely similar to ones destined to occur on the San Andreas

Fault, in particular its northern portion that ruptured in 1906,

and its southernmost reaches near Palm Springs and San

Diego, which last ruptured around the year 1640. Such an

earthquake could have disastrous impacts on the densely

populated urban areas nearby.Therefore, scientists are making

detailed observations of the earthquake, including the

ruptured ground surface along the Denali fault line, strong

seismic shaking, and induced landslides and liquefaction in

the region, to more accurately assess the hazards from such

earthquakes and relay those assessments to local officials in

ways that could be acted upon.

The M6.5 San Simeon earthquake occurred on December 22,

2003, with an epicenter near the Pacific coast in central

California.While it did not rupture the surface, the quake

triggered landslides and caused strong shaking, with the

worst damage in Paso Robles, 24 miles southeast of the

epicenter, where numerous older buildings were damaged

and one building collapsed, killing two people. In addition,

significant liquefaction damaged housing and buried utilities

in Oceano, nearly 50 miles away. Repeated thrust-type

earthquakes such as this are responsible for building

California’s Coast Ranges.The area around San Simeon has

experienced significant earthquakes in 1853, 1906, and

1952, the last being the largest at magnitude 6.2 and centered

just 6 miles from the San Simeon event. Similar “blind”

thrusts caused the magnitude 6.7 Coalinga earthquake in

1983, also in the Central Coast Ranges, as well as the $47

billion Northridge earthquake that struck the Los Angeles area

in 1994. In response to the San Simeon earthquake, the USGS

produced a ShakeMap within 9 minutes of the event.The

ShakeMap served as the basis for a loss estimation by the

California OES using FEMA’s HAZUS software within 1 hour.

Such estimations used to take 1-2 days, with OES calling each

county and waiting for estimates based on field visits.

CALTRANS used the ShakeMap information to determine the

number and location of bridges that needed to be inspected.

USGS data and analysis allowed PG&E to decide not to defer

critical maintenance on the Diablo Canyon nuclear power

plant when it was demonstrated that the earthquake had

actually reduced stress on the faults near the plant. USGS also

provided real-time information on aftershock location and

probability of occurrence.

The long-anticipated M 6.0 Parkfield earthquake struck

central California at 17:15:14 UTC on September 28, 2004.

The epicenter was located 11 km southeast of the rural town

of Parkfield adjacent to Gold Hill and on the San Andreas

Fault.The 2004 Parkfield earthquake is the sixth in a series of

similar earthquakes that have occurred on the Parkfield

section of the San Andreas Fault since the great (M7.8) 1857

Fort Tejon earthquake.The 2004 Parkfield earthquake,

anticipated since 1984, occurred on the San Andreas Fault

within a dense network of geophysical sensors specifically

designed to trap it. No precursory changes were observed

even though the epicentral region was instrumented to detect

a variety of subtle precursors that might be used for shortterm earthquake prediction. Little structural damage occurred

in the rural epicentral region, but surprising near-source

variations in the strong shaking were recorded. Strong 

46
shaking decreased more rapidly with distance than predicted

by models that serve as the basis for current building codes.

The USGS supported a project to demonstrate the potential to

solve challenging scientific and engineering problems by

combining the capabilities of the USGS and the NSFsponsored IRIS and the NEES. A pilot field study was

conducted in August 2004 on the use of state-of-the-art

seismic recording instrumentation. A new NEES shaker truck

generated seismic waves as proxies for earthquake waves.The

excitement of the community about the potential of such

collaborations was evident in the growth of the experiment to

include resources and participants from the MAE Center,

SCEC, the Center for Embedded Network Sensing, and the

High Performance Wireless Research and Education Network

(all NSF-supported), and the Los Alamos National Laboratory

(LANL). A tremendous dataset was collected for study of nonlinear sediment response, ground motion site and basin

effects, basin and fault imaging, and broad-scale deep

imaging. Collaborations continue with ongoing analyses and

intriguing new results already are beginning to emerge.

In the summer 2004, earthquake researchers completed a

10,000 foot scientific drillhole to within a few hundred

meters of the San Andreas fault near the Central California

town of Parkfield.The research team, spearheaded by the

USGS and Stanford University, will make field and laboratory

measurements and install a variety of underground

instruments that will help scientists better predict the timing

and severity of earthquake activity along the 800 mile-long

fault.This completed Stage 1 of the ambitious drilling project

called the San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth (SAFOD),

one of the four components of NSF’s EarthScope MRE

initiative. Data are now being analyzed in preparation for the

commencement in April 2005 of Stage 2 drilling, which will

extend the borehole to cross the San Andreas fault at a depth

of approximately 3 km.When complete, SAFOD will be the

first underground earthquake observatory to penetrate a

seismically active fault zone, giving scientists a unique

opportunity to continuously monitor a section of the fault

where earthquakes actually happen.The drilling project is a

collaborative effort between the USGS, NSF, and the

International Continental Drilling Program (ICDP).

In recognizing the important role that sedimentary basins

play in controlling strong-ground motions from earthquakes,

the USGS has conducted structure and velocity imaging and

wave propagation studies in the Santa Clara Valley (“Silicon

Valley”), south of San Francisco Bay.This major population

center is exposed to a significant seismic hazard from

bounding faults, with the San Andreas Fault on the west and

the Hayward and Calaveras Faults on the east. A variety of

seismic and geologic studies have led to a new 3D structural

model for the Santa Clara sedimentary basin. A series of

seismic imaging experiments have yielded revised

information on the velocities of buried geologic units.

Together, this information forms the basis for an improved

capability to predict ground motions from potentially

damaging earthquakes. Our predictions are being compared

with actual ground motion recordings of local earthquakes

from a 50-element array of portable recorders.The studies

underway in the Santa Clara Valley are capable of forming the

template for seismic hazard evaluation in other urban areas

across the United States.

The USGS and King County (Washington) signed an

Interagency Agreement that funds a detailed investigation of

the Southern Whidbey Island fault near the Brightwater

Wastewater Treatment plant site, a $1.8 billion dollar project

and the largest public capital improvement project in

Washington State.The USGS identified the probable extension

of the fault last summer using a combination of

aeromagnetic, Lidar imagery, and field studies. Based on these

studies and using funding from King County, the USGS has

opened four research trenches across two distinct strands of

the fault.These trenches reveal evidence of young faulting

cutting through the Brightwater site and evidence of

significant liquefaction that has occurred in past earthquakes.

Neither result was initially considered in plant design; the

USGS subsequently met with the Brightwater engineering

design team to discuss the implication of the findings on

seismic and foundation design.

47

An instrumental shaking intensity map for the 2004 Parkfield earthquake.
Selected State, Territorial, And Local Accomplishments

Hawaii

Hawaii supported the USGS ANSS to upgrade seismic

networks in Hawaii to more rapidly detect earthquakes and

generate products that estimate ground-shaking effects.

Hawaii also partnered with NOAA, the State Office of

Planning, and the University of Hawaii to gather data on

unique volcanic-based soil profiles for the islands of Hawaii

and Maui.The information will be used to upgrade HAZUS

models to more accurately simulate soil ground shaking

effects to improve damage estimates.

Nevada

Funding from the NEHRP has been critical to better

characterizing the earthquake hazards in urban and suburban

areas in Nevada. NEHRP funds through the USGS and NSF

have supported seismic monitoring that has led to new

discoveries about deep earthquakes in northern Nevada and

fault studies in northern and southern Nevada. The

combination of geodetic measurements (chiefly from

ultrahigh precision global positioning system instruments),

seismic monitoring, geologic mapping, and fault-trench

studies is revealing that about 20 percent of the motion

between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate is

along the Walker Lane, a zone of northwest-trending strikeslip faults in western Nevada and eastern California. Most of

the remainder of the plate motion is accommodated along the

San Andreas fault system farther west in California.

Oregon

Trench investigation along the Portland Hills Fault by

DOGAMI reveals deformed sediment layers, providing strong

evidence of fault activity during the past 10,000 years.

DOGAMI and the USGS are currently conducting Light

Detection and Ranging remote sensing terrain imaging in the

Portland Metro area to better define active faults and locate

unknown faults.

DOGAMI released a new Map of Selected Earthquakes for

Oregon, 1841 through 2002, that pinpoints 14,000 historic

and recent earthquakes.

Texas

The Texas Regional Seismographic Network recently grew to a

total of eight permanent stations with the addition of a new

station in West Texas (MNTX) in 2003 and a new station in

Nacogdoches in 2004 (NATX).These new stations are both

joint projects between the University of Texas (UT) at Austin,

Texas Tech University, and the USGS. In conjunction with the

installation of MNTX, the State forged an additional

collaboration with seismologists at UT El Paso to broaden the

circle of those interested in and willing to help maintain the

station. In conjunction with station NATX, a similar

collaboration was forged with scientists at Stephen F. Austin

State University. Both of these stations are members of the

ANSS.

MNTX and NATX are equipped with state-of-the-art threecomponent broadband seismometers (Streckeisen STS-2) and

24-bit digitizers (Quanterra Q730) and each delivers its data

in quasi-real-time to the NEIC in Golden, Colorado, to be

analyzed jointly with data from other ANSS stations.The

MNTX station is equipped with satellite communications; the

NATX station delivers its data via the Internet. NATX came

online in August 2004 and is delivering high quality data

quite reliably.These new stations join JCT (Junction,TX), LTX

(Lajitas,TX), and HKT (Hockley,TX) as flagship ANSS stations.

In addition to the flagship stations, four other stations make

up the TexSeis network.These include MDO (MacDonald

Observatory, near Fort Davis,TX), LBTX (Lubbock,TX), and

AMTX (Amarillo,TX).These consist of Guralp 40T

seismometers, which are also three-component and

broadband but have slightly noisier characteristics than the

STS-2 seismometers at MNTX and NATX and the Guralp 3T

seismometers at LTX and JCT, and significantly higher than

the top-of-the-line (but no longer manufactured) Streckeisen

STS-1 at HKT.

In July 2004, MNTX, after being online only 8 months,

received a direct hit by lightning. Despite elaborate protection,

virtually every electronic component of the station was ruined

and must be replaced.The USGS immediately agreed, as is

stipulated in the terms of the Memorandum of Agreement, to

replace all the equipment and get the station back in

operating order.While it is not rare for stations to be struck

by lightning, every station has elaborate lightning protection

and it is quite uncommon for them to be damaged so

severely. Only time will tell if this will be a recurring problem

at MNTX. At the moment, there is no reason to move the

station to a different location or install it differently.The site is

outstanding, as is the access provided by the owner (UT

Permanent Land Fund) and the rhyolite host rock, which

provides excellent coupling to bedrock. A great deal of effort

was expended in identifying and obtaining permission to use

this site, and there is no reason to believe that other sites in

the region would suffer fewer lightning strikes.

An additional station near Austin (ATX) was planned and the

site was prepared for installation. Upon testing, however, it

was discovered that the sensor intended to be installed at ATX

was defective.The sensor is recording data but because it has

only the vertical and one horizontal component functioning,

real-time data communications were not installed.The

48
seismometer will be sent back to the manufacturer for repair

before its permanent installation at ATX.

The ANSS stations are also serving as the backbone of a new,

10-year project funded by the NSF, called EarthScope.This

program might be characterized as a “Mission to North

America” because its goal is to understand the structure and

composition of our continent and the processes by which it

has evolved to its current state. One of the four components

of EarthScope is USArray, a dense deployment of 400

seismographic stations in stripes across the United States,

from west to east. Each deployment will last for

approximately 1 year, and then the stations will be removed

and re-deployed to the east.The unprecedented density of the

deployments will bring a great deal of new data and

information, particularly from regions such as Texas, that have

been historically under-instrumented and are less active

seismically. However, these deployments will still be

temporary and it is important to densify the distribution of

permanent stations as well—to provide long-term baseline

observations, help guide us to features of particular interest

for more intensive study, and to calibrate the temporary

stations so they can be used to maximum advantage.TexSeis is

a critical regional network in this nationwide backbone.

The goal is to ensure that every earthquake of magnitude 3.0

or greater that occurs in or near Texas will be located and

reported in the NEIC catalog.There are several reasons for this

choice. First, although magnitude 3.0 events are generally too

small to cause damage, they aid in identifying seismogenic

faults, and thereby facilitate understanding the tectonics of the

Texas region. Second, they provide useful data to model the

regional structure.This structural information is needed to

understand larger events when they occur. Finally, the ultimate

aim is to provide comprehensive information about the

characteristic and maximum intensities of ground motion

that could be expected to occur in Texas as a result of future

earthquakes. Rather than focus efforts on existing cities, it is

prudent to record data that can be used to estimate seismic

hazards statewide, including areas that are now sparsely

populated, and might experience growth in the future.These

estimates of ground accelerations are needed by engineers

and architects to design appropriate buildings for each

location.The successes of building codes in protecting lives

during earthquakes are underscored by almost every event in

the western United States.

Other Organizations

Earthquake Engineering Research Institute

In FY 2003 and 2004, funding continued for the support of

EERI Student Chapters, now located at 23 universities

throughout the United States, including Puerto Rico and one

in Vancouver, BC.The involvement of these young people,

while still in school, has influenced numerous students to

choose earthquake engineering and earthquake hazard

reduction as a career. Many of these students have, in turn,

shared their knowledge and passion about earthquake

mitigation with students in elementary and secondary schools

in the Midwest, Southeast, and California, stimulating

excitement about earthquake engineering and earthquake

hazard reduction in our future scientists and engineers.

• Students at Notre Dame University pride themselves in

the outreach activities they have sponsored, helping to

make a difference in the lives of young people and

spreading earthquake awareness.Their Shakes & Quakes

program aimed at K-12 is designed to stimulate young

minds and allow them to better understand the way new,

life-saving technologies, such as base isolation, change

the way in which engineered structures behave in severe

earthquakes.The chapter members visit local classrooms

and demonstrate how buildings perform using a portable

shake table, LEGO and K’NEX models.

49

EERI’s Shakes & Quakes program aimed at K-12 is designed to stimulate

young minds and allow them to better understand the way new, life-saving

technologies, such as base isolation, change the way in which engineered

structures behave in severe earthquakes. In this picture, elementary students wait

anxiously for the quake to end.
• Students in the Georgia Tech Chapter of EERI have created

a community outreach program for local elementary and

middle schools.They visit classrooms and discuss

earthquakes and the damage they can cause, as well as

preparedness measures.They work with students to build

a model three-story building on a portable shake table

and subject it to motions from the Northridge and Kobe

earthquakes.The program is working to create interest in

earthquake engineering, math, and science.

NEHRP funds have enabled EERI to expand its comprehensive

website to provide access to the EERI Newsletter, immediate

information after damaging earthquakes, post-earthquake

reconnaissance reports, and links to critical, technical

information and programs of value to engineers and others

engaged in earthquake hazard mitigation throughout the

world.The value of web-based information is that it provides

easy access to those in areas of less frequent seismic activity

and expertise to cutting edge research and knowledge about

earthquake hazard mitigation.

In 2003, EERI brought together experts from many

disciplines in a technical workshop focusing on the “legacy of

earthquake engineering” to identify contributions earthquake

engineering has made to other fields of natural and

technological hazard mitigation in the past, and to look to the

future, to the potential that earthquake engineering offers to

mitigate other natural and technological risks and terrorist

threats. A final document summarizing the past and potential

contributions is expected to be published later this year.

The Year 2006 will be the 100th anniversary of the great

1906 San Francisco Earthquake. NEHRP funds have begun to

underwrite early planning of an international conference that

will be held in San Francisco in 2006 to commemorate the

event. EERI, the Seismological Society of America, and the

California Governor’s OES will convene the conference as

partners.The conference will focus on developments in the

earth sciences, engineering, and emergency planning and

response that have taken place during the past century and

offer insights to deal with challenges ahead. It is expected that

this will be the largest, most important earthquake conference

in history, attracting several thousand emergency managers,

earth scientists, and engineers from all over the world to learn

about current codes and practices, emergency procedures, and

gain new insights into the opportunities presented by

developments in engineering and earth science research.

In February 2004, EERI organized a charette at the Alexandria

campus of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State

University. Students and architects competed on designs for

new public buildings in Washington D.C. that utilized the 

security recommendation in FEMA 426, Reference Manual to

Mitigate Potential Terrorist Attacks Against Buildings. Findings from the

charette will be included in FEMA 430, Building, Site, and Layout

Design Guidance to Mitigate Potential Terrorist Attacks, currently in

development by EERI.This publication will describe concepts

in landscape design and architecture that can mitigate the

threat of terrorist attack, without compromising public access

to and enjoyment of a space. It will include a discussion of

current planning efforts of the National Capital Planning

Commission to redesign and secure the public spaces in

Washington D.C.The target audience is architects and

landscape designers who work on public buildings and

spaces.The book is currently at a 75 percent draft stage.

Designing for Earthquakes:A Manual for Architects is an update of a

manual produced in 1978. Part of FEMA’s Multihazard Risk

Management Series, the book is intended to educate architects

about the earthquake hazard and current trends and issues in

seismic structural design and building codes. A 99 percent

draft was presented by EERI to FEMA for final review in

September 2004.The document will be published as FEMA

454.

In a project funded jointly by FEMA and NSF, EERI is

surveying current academic programs at university

departments of architecture throughout the United States to

determine the nature and extent of seismic design in the

education of today’s architects.The results will be provided to

NSF in the spring 2005 and will hopefully be a tool to

influence increased attention to hazards mitigation in the

education of today’s architects.

Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering

Research

To advance hazard mitigation, it is essential to enhance public

understanding about hazards and the necessary steps to

achieve it–on personal, political, and scientific levels. MCEER

endeavors to work with disseminators of information to reach

the public arena, using its website, public briefings, publicly

oriented publications, and media opportunities. Perhaps more

significantly, however, such prominent media vehicles as the

Discovery Channel and the New York Times, to name but a

few, are important conveyors of messages critical to the

execution of earthquake and other hazard mitigation efforts.

MCEER has worked with the Discovery Channel on three

programs in the last 2 years to advance understanding of the

earthquake hazard and potentials for mitigation. One of these

of particular pride to MCEER-which derives substantial

financial support from the State of New York-is Earthquakes in

New York City?, which was designed to educate viewers in the

eastern United States either unaware or unwilling to accept

the threat of earthquakes outside of California.To further this

message in print media, MCEER contributed to a full-page

article in the New York Times this past summer, highlighting

50
the vulnerability of the city to many hazards and the ongoing

efforts to help mitigate against them.The same article

described the integration of information for all hazards and

illustrated the potential connections between earthquake

research and research related to other hazards, such as blast.

Assessing damage and disruption and prioritizing response

resources are perhaps the most significant challenges facing

crisis managers after a major disaster. Rapid impact and

damage assessment—for example, the identification of

collapsed structures—is especially critical because research on

earthquake mortality and morbidity indicates that death tolls

rise following earthquakes unless trapped victims can be

found and extricated in a timely manner. Rapid and accurate

situation assessment also helps response managers to better

estimate impacts and allocate resources to areas of greatest

need. Recognizing that remote-sensing technologies can make

a major contribution to improving post-disaster damage and

situation assessment, MCEER researchers have carried out

pioneering research on post-earthquake damage assessment

using a range of remote-sensing techniques, including

synthetic aperture radar and moderate resolution optical

imagery. Most recently, researchers have been investigating the

use of high-resolution QuickBird imagery in post-disaster

reconnaissance in the December 2003 Bam earthquake.

The increasing availability of high-resolution images and

improved potential for collecting data in near-real-time, i.e.,

through the use of unmanned airborne vehicles, are making

even more significant advancements possible. Remotelysensed data are now being used in the development of new

tools, such as the VIEWS (Visualizing Earthquake Impacts

With Satellite Imagery) system, which was developed by

MCEER researchers and deployed for post-earthquake

reconnaissance following the Bam event.The goal of MCEER’s

remote sensing research group is to triangulate data obtained

using different technologies and merge those data with

advanced GIS to develop integrated decision support systems

for post-earthquake response.

The FHWA and MCEER have conducted workshops and

conferences to further the exchange of knowledge among

research professionals and engineers in the United States and

abroad. Annual collaborative workshops have been held with

Japan,Taiwan, and the People’s Republic of China.Workshop

proceedings are available to researchers and practitioners to

gain a better understanding of policy and practices employed

elsewhere.

The 4th National Seismic Conference, which was held in

Memphis,Tennessee on February 8-10, 2004, drew over 200

registrants from state transportation departments from across

the United States.The venue especially allowed participants

from the mid- America zone to participate. Attendance and

interest is evidence of the increased awareness and of the

need to protect highway structures in parts of the country

where severe earthquakes can hit, but do so with a return

period of several hundred years.Topics at the conference

included the provisions available for the design of new

bridges as well as case studies of successful retrofit strategies.

Instrumentation for seismic monitoring was purchased as

part of MCEER’s FHWA contract and delivered for the cable

stayed bridge in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Data will be

collected and transmitted for further study to USGS, FHWA,

Missouri DOT, and Illinois DOT. Upon appropriate security

clearance, data will be shared with authorized researchers and

educators.This response data will help engineers and

academics gain a better understanding of the dynamic

characteristics of the new bridge and pave the way for more

earthquake resistant designs in the future.

Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center

A centerpiece of PEER’s program is new research on

simulation models and computational methods to assess the

performance of structural and geotechnical systems. Breaking

the barriers of traditional methods and software development

protocols, PEER has embarked on a completely new approach

in the earthquake engineering community by developing an

open-source, object-oriented software framework. OpenSees

is a collection of modules to facilitate the implementation of

models and simulation procedures for structural and

geotechnical earthquake engineering. By shared development

using well-designed software interfaces, the open-source

approach has effected collaboration among a substantial

community of developers and users within and outside of

PEER. Unique among software for earthquake engineering,

OpenSees allows integration of models of structures and soils 

51

Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) interferogram showing relative found

displacements measured after the 1994 Northridge earthquake.
to investigate challenging problems in soil-structurefoundation interaction. In addition to improved models for

reinforced concrete structures, shallow and deep foundations,

and liquefiable soils, OpenSees is designed to take advantage

of the latest developments in databases, reliability methods,

scientific visualization, and high-end computing.

PEER has developed state-of-the-art computational and

information technologies to compute in detail how buildings

and bridges respond to earthquake ground motions. PEER is

making significant advances in computational procedures, and

is educating a new generation of earthquake engineers who

are familiar with the latest information technologies.To

accelerate development and broaden acceptance, PEER has

made its computational technologies available on-line and has

promoted use through user/developer workshops.

Immediately after a major earthquake, emergency responders

and operators of lifeline systems in the affected area need

guidance as to the likely distribution of damage. In areas that

are densely instrumented with a network of seismometers,

the measured distribution of strong ground shaking can be

rapidly assembled and broadcasted as an indirect measure of 

likely damage. In sparsely instrumented locations, however,

insufficient empirical data may be available.To supplement

such data, new methods make it possible to automatically

determine finite-source parameters of earthquakes such as the

causative fault plane characteristics and rupture velocity.These

source parameters are then used to simulate near-fault ground

motions for areas where there are no nearby recording

instruments.This process can be carried out automatically, to

produce and distribute estimates of shaking within 30

minutes of the event, and can then be reviewed and updated

by seismologists in real time.The process is aided by previous

PEER studies aimed at improving simulation technologies.

This is an important contribution toward the objective of

near-real-time reporting of earthquake shaking hazard, and

has been provided to ShakeMap V2.x software for widespread

application.

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PEER’s OpenSees computer model representation of soil-structure interaction of a bridge.
Executive Order 12699—Seismic Safety of Federal and

Federally Assisted or Regulated New Building Construction

Executive Order 12699, issued in 1990, applies to federal

agencies that are responsible for (1) designing and

constructing new federal buildings, (2) constructing and

leasing new buildings for federal use, (3) providing or

guaranteeing financing for new buildings, or (4) regulating

the structural safety of new buildings.The Order directs these

agencies to maintain and ensure the use of appropriate

seismic design and construction standards for new buildings

within their purview. Activities carried out pursuant to 

Executive Order 12699 during Fiscal Year (FY) 2003 and

2004 are reported below for each affected agency.

Architect of the Capitol

Although it is not required to comply with Executive Orders

as an agency of the legislative branch, the Architect of the

Capitol has voluntarily striven to observe seismic safety

standards in the spirit of Executive Orders 12699 and 12941.

During FY 2003 and 2004, the Architect of the Capitol

required that all new construction for the legislative branch

comply with the seismic resistance provisions of the Building

Officials and Code Administrators (BOCA) International’s

National Building Code (NBC).

53

The Architect of the Capitol has voluntarily striven to observe seismic safety standards in the spirit of Executive Orders 12699 and 12941.

III. Seismic Safety of Federal

Buildings:A Progress Report on

Federal Agencies’ Execution of

Executive Orders 12699 and 12941
Department of Commerce

The Department has required that new facilities designed for

its use meet all building codes in effect where the building is

to be located, including seismic safety codes.

Department of Defense

For more than 30 years, the Department of Defense (DoD)

has maintained seismic design standards for new facilities

built for the Army, Navy, and Air Force. During FY 2003 and

2004, DoD worked to develop supplemental standards

applicable to new construction of critical national defense

assets.The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) continued

its development of tools and standards that can be used to

improve seismic design for new buildings, power generation

facilities, dams, retaining walls, and mechanical and electrical

equipment.The Naval Facilities Engineering Command

(NAVFAC) began updating the seismic design criteria for

Navy piers and wharves.

Department of Energy

The Department of Energy (DOE) is responsible for the safety

of personnel and activities at all of its sites.This includes

protecting structures and occupants from the effects of

earthquakes and other natural phenomena through

appropriate policies, rules, orders, standards, guidance, and

practices.

During FY 2003 and 2004, evaluations continued to show

that DOE’s seismic design requirements were substantially

equivalent to the standards mandated under Executive Order

12699, and DOE continued to require that its orders and

standards relating to natural hazards be consistent with part

830 (Nuclear Safety Management) of Title 10 of the Code of

Federal Regulations (10 CFR Part 830).

DOE Order 420.1A, “Facility Safety,” required that DOE

facilities be designed, constructed, and operated so that the

public, workers, and the environment are protected from the

adverse impacts of earthquakes and other natural hazards.

Related design guidance was provided in Design Guide DOE

G-420.1-2.The Department continued to require that new

buildings be constructed in accordance with DOE Standard

(STD) 1020-2002, “Natural Phenomena Hazards Design and

Evaluation Criteria for Department of Energy Facilities.”

Accompanying standards included DOE-STD-1021, “Natural

Phenomena Hazards Performance Categorization Guidelines

for Structures, Systems, and Components;” DOE-STD-1022,

“Characterization Criteria;” and DOE-STD-1023, “Assessment

Criteria.”

Following are examples of recent progress in seismic safety

relating to new structures at DOE sites:

• Oak Ridge National Laboratory,Tennessee—At the Y-12

National Security Complex, seismic hazard studies were

updated to reflect all new information obtained over the

last 10 years, including the latest U.S. Geological Survey

(USGS) and NEHRP seismic hazard maps. Studies

relating to the spallation neutron source facility

concluded that the structural design of the facility’s target

building can accommodate the latest USGS regional

accelerations. New buildings constructed during the past

2 years are in compliance with the seismic requirements

of International Building Code (IBC) 2000.

• Pantex Plant,Texas—The seismic requirements of DOE

Order 420.1A, DOE STD-1020-2002, and IBC

2000/2003 were incorporated into site design and

construction projects, and used in designing the Building

12-44 and Building 12-64 upgrade projects.

• Savannah River Site, South Carolina—DOE began a

reevaluation of the Site’s probabilistic seismic hazard

analysis.This work is being performed using hazard

determination methodology, the latest assessments of

local seismic sources, and ground motion attenuation

models.

• Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, California—

DOE STD-1020-2002 was formally adopted into the

Laboratory’s Work Smart Standards, requiring the use of

IBC 2000 Seismic Use Group I (or equivalent) criteria for

designs of new Performance Category 1 Structures,

Systems, and Components (SSCs), and Seismic Use Group

III criteria for new Performance Category 2 SSCs. For

Performance Category 3 SSCs, peak ground accelerations

are determined from the site’s probabilistic seismic

hazard analysis and used in conjunction with DOE STD1020-2002 for building designs or evaluations.These

criteria were used in designing or constructing several

54

At the Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Y-12 National Security Complex,

seismic hazard studies were updated to reflect all new information obtained over

the last 10 years, including the latest USGS and NEHRP seismic hazard maps.
new structures, including Building 155 (isotope

separation facility); Building 140 (international security

research facility); Building 471 (central cafeteria);

Building 368 (bio-safety level-3 facility); and Buildings

142, 242, and 264 (replacement office buildings).

• Bonneville Power Administration, Oregon—DOE worked

to implement IBC 2000/2003 seismic requirements for

new construction during 2003 and 2004. It now

enforces IBC 2003 and the code’s state supplements,

requirements that are consistent with state building codes

and NEHRP provisions applicable within Bonneville

Power’s service region.

• Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, California—The

molecular foundry was designed to the requirements of

the 2001 California Building Code and the Laboratory

publication LBNL RD 3.22, “Lateral Force Design

Criteria.”

• Brookhaven National Laboratory, New York—The

Building Code of New York State, May 2002 Edition,

which is consistent with IBC 2000, was used in

designing two new buildings: the Center for Functional

Nanomaterials and the Research Support Building.

• Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico—The

Laboratory updated the structural chapter of its

“Engineering Standards Manual,” as well as the majority

of its construction specifications, to ensure compliance

with Executive Order 12699, DOE Order 420.1A, DOE

G-420.1-2, and DOE STD-1020-2002.

• Hanford Site,Washington—The Richland Operations

Office issued a contract modification to clarify the

requirements of subpart B of 10 CFR Part 830, and to

ensure that the contractors apply these requirements

during the planning or conceptual-design stage of any

new facilities subject to subpart B.The Office of River

Protection has been applying DOE Order 420.1A to the

design and construction of the high-level waste, pretreatment, and low-activity waste buildings.This Office

has also begun reassessing portions of the 1996

probabilistic seismic hazard analysis relating to the waste

treatment and immobilization plant.The objective is to

reduce the uncertainty in the seismic design basis that

resulted from extrapolating California attenuation data to

the Hanford Site, and from limited shear wave velocity

data. New shear wave velocity profiles down to 500 feet

are being acquired using downhole and spectral

amplification of surface wave techniques. Geophysical

data are being reanalyzed, the latest Pacific Earthquake

Engineering Research Group attenuation relations are

being applied, and uncertainty in attenuation related to

interbedded sediments among basalt layers between 500

and 1,500 feet in depth is being remodeled.

• Idaho National Engineering and Environmental

Laboratory, Idaho—Twenty-five outdated analog

instruments were replaced with digital strong motion

accelerographs in facilities and at free-field sites (not

within buildings). Earthquake analysis programs were

replaced with SEISAN, a program that allows analyses of

both seismograms and accelerograms. Performance

Category 3 and 4 design-basis earthquake site response

analyses and enveloping time histories were developed (5

percent damped spectra) for the Idaho Nuclear

Technology and Engineering Center (completed) and the

Test Reactor Area (in review).

Department of Health and Human Services

Standards and guidelines have been in place since 1992 for

federally assisted construction that is within the purview of

the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Since

1999, the Department has also maintained construction

guidelines for buildings to be leased by the Indian Health

Service (IHS). All new Departmental facilities must comply

with the seismic requirements of national model construction

codes.

Federal Bureau of Prisons

The Federal Bureau of Prisons, a component of the U.S.

Department of Justice, published seismic design and

certification guidelines in accordance with the Department’s

Seismic Safety Program.These guidelines require that new 

55

DOE is responsible for the safety of personnel and activities at all of its sites.

This includes protecting structures and occupants from the effects of

earthquakes.This illustration is an example of properly anchored cylinders.
buildings constructed for the Bureau comply with the

National Fire Protection Association’s Building Construction

and Safety Code (NFPA 5000) and the seismic safety

standards of the Interagency Committee for Seismic Safety in

Construction (ICSSC). Any local requirements that are more

stringent must also be met.

Federal Emergency Management Agency

For buildings leased by FEMA, compliance with the

requirements of Executive Order 12699 is included in the

standard GSA lease language.The building owner must affirm

compliance.

For buildings owned by FEMA, the Facility Management

Branch has a 2-year-old assessment of all FEMA buildings.

FEMA also tracks the condition of buildings through the Real

Property Management System (RPMS). Seismic issues or

retrofitting are not kept track of in this system; repairs that are

generally accomplished are deferred maintenance or updating

mechanical and other systems.The Facilities Management

Branch will work to identify the best means of capturing

seismic retrofit opportunities in the RPMS and during

condition assessments.

General Services Administration

In 2003, the General Services Administration (GSA) adopted

the family of codes issued by the International Code Council

(ICC) in lieu of the NBC, the Uniform Building Code (UBC),

and the Standard Building Code (SBC). Structural designs for

new buildings have since conformed to the latest edition of

IBC.

GSA promotes the use of new technology in seismic safety

and has investigated, tested, and installed steel-plate shear

walls, unbounded braces, and base isolators in buildings.The

design of the Seattle Federal Courthouse incorporated a steelplate shear wall system in conjunction with concrete-filled

pipe columns for its seismic lateral system.This innovative

approach, referred to as the Steel Plate/Composite Concrete

Shear Wall System, was developed over 24 years through

collaboration among GSA, the University of California at

Berkeley, Magnusson Klemencic Associates, and the Canadian

Institute of Steel Construction. It provides the building’s

primary system for gravity, wind, and earthquake resistance,

and is expected to improve seismic performance, speed up

construction, and save construction dollars.

The Civil Engineering Research Foundation awarded the 2004

“Charles Pankow Award for Innovation” to the GSA Seattle

Courthouse Team and Magnusson Klemencic Associates at the

American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) awards ceremony

on May 12, 2004.The Pankow award recognizes collaborative

efforts that demonstrate innovative design-, materials-, or

construction-related research and development, transferred 

into practice, that enhance productivity and performance in

the industry.

Public Works and Government Services Canada invited the

director of GSA’s Pacific Rim Region Property Development

Division, and the manager of GSA’s Seismic Safety Program, to

participate in an informal exchange on seismic and security

issues facing both agencies. GSA seismic engineers

subsequently gave presentations on seismic and security

criteria and on recent project successes and challenges.

GSA and the Pennsylvania State University Department of

Architectural Engineering are conducting research on a

multihazard-resistant, panelized brick-veneer wall system.The

objectives are to develop (1) a brick-veneer wall system with

steel stud backup walls that minimizes the potential for

cracking under high wind loads; (2) a prefabricated,

panelized wall system with seismic isolation connections; and

(3) a method of strengthening the wall system for improved

performance under impact and blast loading situations.

Dynamic racking tests will be performed to verify in-plane

seismic isolation.The wall system will be designed to offer

optional enhancement of impact resistance through the use of

composites.

To secure private-sector expertise and achieve excellence in

seismic-structural and blast design, the Office of the Chief

Architect awarded three supplemental Seismic/Structural Blast

contracts to nationally recognized firms.These contracts are

available for use by all GSA regional offices as well as by other

executive branch agencies.

Department of the Interior

The Department of the Interior (DOI) Seismic Safety Program

has implemented all requirements of Executive Order 12699.

The Department has required use of the latest, most stringent

building codes since before the Order was issued, and its

practices for new buildings conformed to “Recommendation

of Design and Construction Practices in Implementation of

Executive Order 12699” even before its issuance in 1995.

Seismic safety resources that DOI applies to the design and

construction of new federal facilities include Departmental

requirements about the use of appropriate model building

codes, and analyses of local building codes that may be used

for particular projects. New facilities are designed by DOI’s inhouse engineering design resources, or by private architecture

and engineering (A&E) firms under contracts that require

them to use the most current state and local structural design

codes. Regardless of their source, all designs are reviewed by

DOI engineers to ensure compliance with seismic safety and

other technical requirements.

Within DOI, seismic safety issues are routinely discussed

among the bureaus’ seismic safety contacts. Departmental

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seismic safety coordinators routinely conduct workshops,

attended by all bureau seismic safety contacts, where

compliance with the Seismic Safety Program is discussed.

Program compliance is monitored and documented through

frequent Department-wide seismic safety status reports.The

Department also shares information on seismic safety with

other agencies.

DOI bureaus occasionally receive requests to supersede

prescribed building codes with local building codes. On these

rare occasions, DOI seismic safety coordinators review the

local codes to ensure that they are at least as stringent as the

prescribed code.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

has incorporated the requirements of Executive Order 12699

into its “NASA Facilities Program Implementation

Requirements” policy document. NASA provides technology

updates prepared by ICSSC to the facility engineers at NASA

centers and installations.

NASA’s decentralized management structure allows its facility

engineers to meet user requirements and still provide welldesigned and well-constructed facilities that conform to

today’s engineering and environmental standards and

practices, and national and local building codes. NASA views

implementation of Executive Order 12699 as good

engineering practice. Incorporation of all appropriate safety

standards and codes is left to the design professionals working

on each project.

NASA centers conduct design reviews to ensure compliance

with all standards, codes, laws, and Executive Orders. Inhouse personnel check designs prepared by contracted

architects and engineers, and peer reviews are held for inhouse designs. Life-safety standards are used for most

facilities; higher standards are used when mission-critical

facilities are involved. NASA facility engineers evaluate each

prospective facility in consultation with the end users to

determine the appropriate level of safety.

Seismic safety has been a priority and a routine part of facility

planning, design, construction, and budgeting at NASA

headquarters and at NASA centers in seismically active areas.

The Facilities Engineering and Real Property Division at NASA

headquarters leads NASA seismic safety efforts. A member of

the Division serves on the ICSSC and oversees dissemination

of seismic safety information. NASA uses local and model

building codes and relies upon the ICSSC to determine which

model code best meets NEHRP requirements.

Executive Order 12699 has had little impact on NASA because

it has always been NASA practice to design and construct

facilities that meet or exceed current seismic safety standards.

Contracting procedures used for new construction have not

changed and NASA has not allocated additional staff, funding,

or training in response to the Order. Designing to current

safety standards (seismic or other) is considered to be an

engineer’s professional responsibility, although NASA provides

the training needed to keep its engineers current in their

fields. Although it costs more to design and construct

buildings to ever more stringent seismic safety standards and

codes, NASA believes that these added costs are necessary to

provide safe facilities and should be considered in the overall

economic justification of new facilities.

Department of the Navy

The Department of the Navy (DoN) has maintained a seismic

safety policy that is in full compliance with the requirements

of the Earthquake Hazards Reduction Act of 1977 and

Executive Orders 12699 and 12941.The DoN component

that designs and constructs Navy shore facilities, the NAVFAC,

is responsible for establishing cost-effective design policies

and criteria for DoN that incorporate adequate seismic safety

standards.

In July 2002, DoN, in partnership with the other military

services in the DoD, updated the building standards and

design criteria for new U.S. military facilities in Unified

Facilities Criteria (UFC) 1-200-01, “Design: General Building

Requirements.” UFC 1-200-01 incorporates nationally

accepted private-sector standards and practices, referencing

IBC 2000 along with specific code modifications for facilities

unique to DoD. DoN and the other DoD services have since

begun updating UFC 1-200-01 to reference IBC 2003.

This will ensure that DoD’s seismic safety building standards

and design criteria continue to reflect the most current,

nationally accepted private-sector standards and practices.

NAVFAC Instruction 11000.40, “Seismic Safety Requirements

for Navy Owned and Leased Buildings,” released in October

2003, updates and promulgates DoN-specific seismic safety

policy. It requires that all new Navy buildings, whether owned

or leased, must be designed and constructed in accordance

with UFC 1-200-01. Similarly, the NAVFAC P-73 “Real Estate

Procedural Manual” requires that new leases comply with

current NAVFAC seismic criteria.

Tennessee Valley Authority

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) has the technical

expertise needed to develop designs, including seismic

designs, for a wide variety of buildings.TVA also provides

financial assistance for building construction through its

economic development programs and through loans made to

its electric power distributors.

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TVA has continued to update the implementation procedure

for Executive Order 12699 that it originally issued in 1993.

This procedure establishes compliance requirements for new

buildings and for additions to existing buildings, specifying

document review processes, the responsibilities of the

approval engineer and construction verifier, minimum

qualifications for the approval engineer and construction

verifier, and required documentation. It also includes a model

seismic safety clause to be used in contracts for new

construction and expansions.

TVA’s approval engineers, who perform building plan and

specification reviews related to seismic safety, must meet the

following minimum qualifications: have a degree in structural

or civil engineering, have at least 5 years of experience in

structural design and in analysis of building framing and

foundations, and be a licensed professional engineer.

Construction verifiers, who review final construction to

ensure that it is consistent with design drawings and

specifications, must be competent in construction methods to

a degree that ensures accurate performance of this function.

Contractor personnel can fill either of these roles provided

they meet the minimum qualifications.

During each construction project, the approval engineers and

construction verifiers are required to provide a certificate of

seismic compliance to TVA’s seismic safety coordinator.The

coordinator has programmatic responsibility for ensuring that

seismic safety requirements are being met by TVA’s operating

groups.The contractor’s architect or engineer with

responsibility for the building design must submit a written

statement to TVA that acknowledges the provisions of

Executive Order 12699 and identifies the code used for

seismic design.

Executive Order 12699 also affects TVA’s economic

development programs that provide financial assistance for

new construction.These programs review beneficiaries’

design and construction contracts to verify seismic safety

compliance.The beneficiaries are local and regional

economic-and industrial-development organizations located

within the Tennessee Valley area. Assistance is provided for

new construction within industrial parks, for expansion of

existing industrial facilities, and for other construction

associated with commercial and business development.

TVA operates some facilities, such as nuclear power plants

and dams, which require special seismic safety standards.

TVA’s nuclear facilities are regulated by the Nuclear

Regulatory Commission (NRC) and are designed to an

operating basis-earthquake and a safe shutdown-earthquake

that fully meet NRC requirements.TVA’s Dam Safety Program

operates under the Federal Guidelines for Dam Safety and complies

with the seismic safety requirements specified therein.

Department of Veterans Affairs

The Department’s seismic regulations were promulgated long

before the 1993 deadline set by Executive Order 12699.

Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Handbook H-18-8

(formerly H-08-8), “Seismic Design Requirements,” has been

periodically updated, with the latest edition released in

December 2003.The requirements in this handbook

reference, and are fully coordinated with, the following

national model codes and standards: IBC 2003; ASCE Standard

31-02, “Seismic Rehabilitation of Existing Buildings;” FEMA

350, “Recommended Seismic Design Criteria for New Steel

Moment-Frame Buildings;” FEMA 353, “Recommended

Specifications and Quality Assurance Guidelines for Steel

Moment-Frame Construction for Seismic Applications;” and

FEMA 356, “Prestandard and Commentary for the Seismic

Rehabilitation of Buildings.”

VA has invested significant funds since 1973 to ensure that all

new construction projects, as well as seismic upgrades of

existing buildings, are in full compliance with VA seismic

design standards. Although budget constraints have slowed

new construction in recent years, seismic upgrade projects

continue to receive significant funding. Recent projects

involving seismic design for new buildings include the

following: a building being designed for Anchorage, Alaska,

that will house regional offices and outpatient clinic facilities;

a new medical facility being planned for Las Vegas, Nevada; a

replacement inpatient building constructed in Memphis,

Tennessee; and an inpatient facility being planned for San

Juan, Puerto Rico.

Executive Order 12941—Seismic Safety of Existing

Federally Owned or Leased Buildings

Executive Order 12941, issued in 1994, applies to federal

agencies that own or lease buildings for federal use.The

Executive Order directed the ICSSC to adopt minimum

standards of seismic safety for existing federally owned or

leased buildings. In accordance with the adopted minimum

standards, federal agencies were required to evaluate and

mitigate unacceptable seismic risk in their buildings.

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TVA has the technical expertise needed to develop designs, including seismic

designs, for a wide variety of buildings.
In addition, the Executive Order required that federal agencies

estimate the costs of bringing their buildings into compliance

with ICSSC standards and directed FEMA to use these cost

estimates to prepare a report for Congress “on how to achieve

an adequate level of seismic safety in federally owned and

leased buildings in an economically feasible manner.” In late

FY 2000, FEMA submitted a draft of this report to the Office

of Management and Budget (OMB). FEMA has made several

revisions to the report in response to this review and has

resubmitted the report to OMB.

Activities carried out pursuant to Executive Order 12941

during FY 2003 and 2004 are reported below for each

affected agency.

Architect of the Capitol

During FY 2003 and 2004, the Architect of the Capitol

required that renovation projects, when feasible, include

upgrades to the seismic safety standards specified in ICSSC

Recommended Practice 4, “Standards of Seismic Safety for

Existing Federally Owned or Leased Buildings and

Commentary.” One such project is the renovation of the U.S.

Botanic Garden’s administration building, planned for FY

2006. In the design for this work, hazardous elements such as

an incomplete load path were corrected by strengthening

roof-to-wall connections.The added cost for this seismic

upgrade was projected to be less than 1 percent of total

project costs.

The Architect of the Capitol has also been including seismic

studies in its condition assessments of existing buildings.

These evaluations are guided by ASCE Standard 31-03,

“Seismic Evaluation of Existing Buildings.”

Department of Commerce

The Department of Commerce has a small number of

facilities, and few of them failed the seismic evaluations

carried out pursuant to Executive Order 12941. One of the

Department’s bureaus, the National Institute of Science and

Technology (NIST), has no facilities needing seismic

rehabilitation at this time.The other primary bureau, the

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA),

has a few buildings that have been identified as needing

rehabilitation.

The National Weather Service (NWS), a part of NOAA, has

been systematically renovating all of its facilities, and this

work has included the correction of any seismic deficiencies.

NWS awarded a contract to renovate its office in St. Paul

Island, Alaska, in mid-September 2004; project completion is

anticipated by the end of September 2005.This will remedy

one of the Department’s most severe seismic deficiencies.

Department of Defense

DoD has followed the intent of Executive Order 12941 with a

passive triggering program in compliance with ICSSC

Recommended Practice 6, “Standards of Seismic Safety for

Federally Owned and Leased Buildings.” During FY 2003 and

2004, the USACE and NAVFAC pursued a variety of activities

aimed at enhancing seismic safety among existing facilities.

USACE has been developing seismic evaluation and mitigation

tools, including computer programs, criteria documents,

process flowcharts, decision-making templates, a relative

seismic hazard map, and an expanded benchmark-year table

with Tri-Services criteria.These tools are designed for use

with buildings, power generation facilities, mechanical and

electrical equipment, retaining walls, dams, and other existing

construction.

USACE and DoD started working with other ICSSC-member

agencies to develop a pilot program on seismic safety within

the Nation’s lifeline infrastructure systems. Initial work has

focused on the electric power system. USACE has also used its

ongoing partnership with the power marketing

administrations of DOE and DOI’s Bureau of Reclamation to

identify common interests and concerns regarding the electric

power system.

In addition to providing direct emergency assistance

following earthquakes, researchers from USACE’s Engineering

Research and Development Center have carried out numerous

post-earthquake reconnaissance trips.These trips are intended

to improve scientists’ understanding of the seismic behavior

of structural and geotechnical materials.

In March 2000, NAVFAC issued “Seismic Hazards Mitigation

Program for Facilities Outside of the United States, Its

Territories and Possessions,” to reduce inconsistencies

between the level of protection afforded existing Navy

facilities within the United States and the protection afforded

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NAVFAC recently began updating the seismic design criteria used for evaluating

Navy piers and wharves.
overseas facilities. Since then, occupied Navy buildings

overseas have been inventoried; modified procedures have

been developed to estimate the potential seismic risks faced

by the occupants, missions, and assets of Navy facilities in

Europe; and a prioritized seismic risk strategy has been

created for Europe that is based on the results of the seismic

risk estimation procedures.

NAVFAC recently began updating the seismic design criteria

used for evaluating Navy piers and wharves, and began

contributing to the development of a new version of FEMA

172, “NEHRP Handbook of Techniques for the Seismic

Rehabilitation of Existing Buildings.”The latter effort, which

is being managed by NIST, will update best practices and

recommendations for seismic rehabilitation of existing

buildings, and make FEMA 172 consistent with other FEMA

documents that address the seismic safety of existing

buildings.

In 2003, NAVFAC developed draft guidelines for reassessing

Navy buildings that were found to have the potential for

being “exceptionally high risk” (EHR) in prior seismic

evaluations conducted pursuant to Executive Order 12941.

These guidelines, which are now being reviewed by DoN, are

intended to (1) update and refine the list of potentially EHR

buildings by incorporating risk mitigation actions carried out

to date, and (2) establish a process for prioritizing further

evaluations of these buildings that is based on potential

damage estimates, occupancy, and mission criticality.

NAVFAC has also been participating with FEMA in a pilot

project involving the use of an enhanced version of the

Hazards US (HAZUS) software at the Puget Naval

Shipyard/Bremerton Naval Station.The intent is to

demonstrate the usefulness of HAZUS as an effective and

strategic disaster-related decision-support tool, and to validate

its ability to rapidly predict the potential seismic risk to a

single building or a portfolio of buildings using limited

information.

Department of Energy

DOE natural phenomena hazards (NPH) mitigation programs

continued through FY 2003 and 2004. Headquarters

personnel focused on reviewing and updating requirements

and standards used in mitigating earthquake effects. Fieldlevel activities included identifying and reducing

vulnerabilities to earthquakes through compliance with

Executive Orders 12699 and 12941, and continuing site

characterization efforts to improve understanding of seismic

hazards.

DOE STD-1020-2002, which is consistent with the

requirements of ICSSC Recommended Practice 6, has guided

DOE’s efforts to evaluate and prioritize existing facilities for

seismic mitigation, as required under Executive Order 12941.

Additional guidance has been provided through DOE Order

420.1A, which is consistent with the latest NEHRP and

industry seismic design standards. Because DOE has many

buildings containing hazardous materials, which require

more stringent evaluation criteria, this order includes

supplemental requirements in the areas of nuclear safety,

explosives safety, fire protection, nuclear criticality safety, and

NPH safety.

Following are examples of recent progress in seismic safety

relating to existing structures at DOE sites:

• Oak Ridge National Laboratory,Tennessee—The

Laboratory began implementing its plan to evaluate

buildings for compliance with DOE STD-1020-2002.The

one building found to be seismically deficient during the

initial evaluations conducted pursuant to Executive Order

12941 was retrofitted to meet IBC 2000 seismic

requirements. At the Y-12 National Security Complex,

seismic evaluations of existing nuclear facilities were

performed in preparing the documented safety analysis

reports required under 10 CFR Part 830. These

evaluations were based on the site’s newly updated

seismic hazard studies, which were more stringent than

those required by ICSSC Recommended Practice 6.

• Pantex Plant,Texas—The Pantex site evaluated its building

inventory for potential seismic risks (Paragon Structural

Engineering report) and concluded that 359 buildings

(49 percent of the inventory) were exempted from

seismic evaluation. Evaluations of existing nuclear and

nuclear-explosive facilities were completed, and a

schedule for evaluating existing explosive processing

facilities was approved for FY 2005 and 2006. A project

plan was developed to further investigate specific areas of

concern that emerged from the nuclear and nuclearexplosive facility evaluations.

• Savannah River Site, South Carolina—The glass waste

storage and tritium extraction buildings were determined

to meet the performance requirements and

implementation standards of DOE Order 420.1A, as well

as applicable national standards for the protection of

personnel and processes during NPH events.These

requirements are more stringent than those of ICSSC

Recommended Practice 6.

• Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, California—A

mitigation program and a prioritization system were

implemented for buildings found to be seismically

deficient in evaluations conducted pursuant to Executive

Order 12941. Fifty-three buildings (approximately 8

percent of the building inventory) had been identified as

having unacceptable seismic deficiencies. A 10-year

seismic rehabilitation plan was developed for the 16 most

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vulnerable buildings. It was determined that rehabilitation

in the remaining 37 buildings could await major

renovations. Seismic improvements have already been

made during renovations in the following buildings:

Building 151 (chemistry laboratory), 100 percent of

seismic upgrades completed; Building 321C (engineering

technology complex), 100 percent completed; Building

298 (physics laboratory), 85 percent completed; Building

141 (engineering building), 70 percent completed; and

Building 511 (plant engineering maintenance facility),

30 percent completed.

• Bonneville Power Administration, Oregon—DOE

evaluated one additional building for seismic

vulnerabilities during FY 2003 and 2004.

• Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, California—Using

FEMA 310, “Handbook for Seismic Evaluation of

Buildings—A Prestandard,” and its successor, ASCE

Standard 31-03, the Laboratory has completed 23

building evaluations since 2003.

• Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico—The

Laboratory completed seismic evaluations required under

Executive Order 12941 for those existing facilities that

did not have a model building type assigned to them in

the Department’s Facility Information Management

System. A program modeled on SAFER, the seismic safety

program of the University of California at Berkeley, is

being considered to assist in prioritizing mitigation in

existing facilities.

• Idaho National Engineering and Environmental

Laboratory, Idaho—The Idaho Nuclear Technology and

Engineering Center prepared seismic qualifications for the

bins in Calcined Solids Storage Facility 1.

• Sandia National Laboratories, New Mexico—Sandia

National Laboratories (SNL) has completed many seismic

upgrades since evaluating its existing facilities in 1998.

SNL policy is to consider seismic upgrades to existing

facilities when building modifications are made. On the

basis of recently revised seismic data provided by USGS,

the Sandia Site Office has requested that SNL reassess the

1998 evaluations to determine current vulnerabilities,

and prioritize seismic upgrades among high-risk

facilities. Since the evaluations were performed in 1998,

12 buildings have been classified as high-risk facilities. Of

these, three essential facilities have been upgraded

(Buildings 800, 802, and 880), and two facilities have

been evacuated and demolished (Buildings 805 and

841).Two additional buildings are scheduled for

demolition in FY 2007 and FY 2010 (Buildings 806 and

807).The remaining high-risk facilities are part of a 

conceptual design study that is evaluating renovation or

replacement.

Environmental Protection Agency

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) developed its

National Seismic Safety Program in 1997 and has since

worked to ensure that all of its facilities become compliant

with seismic safety requirements. EPA has been evaluating

seismic safety in buildings scheduled for major alterations

and, more recently, has begun assessing facilities that are

subject to potential seismic risk, regardless of whether

renovations are planned.

During FY 2003 and 2004, EPA completed seismic safety

mitigation or evaluation activities at three EPA-owned

facilities.These projects are described below.

• Region 10 Laboratory, Manchester,Washington—EPA

discovered during construction of a new wing at the

Laboratory that the design of the addition, completed in

1999, had inadequately addressed EPA’s seismic safety

requirements, and had positioned concrete footings for

the wing on beach deposits susceptible to liquefaction

and lateral spreading. EPA concluded that these findings

posed unacceptable risks for this critical facility and

immediately undertook remedial actions. EPA obtained a

full analysis from a qualified seismic engineer,

strengthened the new tilt-up wall concrete building, and

installed more than 100 Geopiers into native soil below

the beach deposits.The dedicated efforts of engineers and

contractors resulted in a successful outcome with

minimal delay (about 2 months) and added costs

acceptable to EPA. EPA also retained a seismic engineer to

evaluate the existing laboratory in accordance with FEMA

310, because a major renovation of the structure was

planned. Several deficiencies were identified, and

mitigation measures were incorporated into the planned

structural modifications.The first phase of the renovation

began in September 2004.

• National Health and Environmental Effects Research

Laboratory,Western Ecology Division, Corvallis,

Oregon—In 2003, EPA conducted a Tier 1 study of the

main building in accordance with FEMA 310.The results

indicated that a Tier 2 study was required, including

geotechnical exploration. A report with findings,

conclusions, and recommendations is due in November

2005. Preliminary reports indicate that the potential for

failure of the soils and foundations during a seismic event

is low or negligible, but that some building modifications

may be needed to achieve acceptable seismic safety.

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• National Risk Management Research Laboratory,Water

Supply and Resources Division, Edison, New Jersey—EPA

is constructing an emergency operations center in a

World War II-era building located at its Laboratory in

Edison. A seismic safety analysis of the existing structure

was included in the design process, and it revealed the

need for additional structural-steel seismic bracing

throughout the roof framing.This bracing was

incorporated into the construction drawings and has

been installed in the 30,000 square-foot, one-story

building.

EPA has begun to evaluate its main laboratory at the Coastal

Ecology Branch in Newport, Oregon; this was prompted

primarily by changes in seismic performance requirements in

the Northwest over the past decade. Also, as part of major

renovations at the Andrew W. Breidenback Environmental

Research Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, EPA is conducting a

seismic safety evaluation of the main, seven-story laboratory

building.Through all of these actions, EPA is continuing to

work to ensure that its people and property are protected

during seismic events.

Federal Bureau of Prisons

The Federal Bureau of Prisons has continued to require that

all major renovation projects at existing facilities nationwide

include prevailing seismic safety standards and building

codes, as applicable, in the project design plans and

specifications.The Bureau receives no special funding or

appropriations specific to this effort.

General Services Administration

As of September 2004, GSA had fully evaluated 43 percent of

the 745 federally owned buildings that it had previously

targeted as seismically deficient. Seismic evaluations of

existing buildings are conducted in accordance with ASCE

Standard 31-03; life safety is the minimum acceptable

performance level for existing federal buildings.

Funding limitations preclude rehabilitation of all buildings

found to have seismic deficiencies.To facilitate efficient and

effective use of available funds, GSA prepared a nationwide list

of owned properties ranked by seismic risk.This “Seismic

Hazard Priority List” ranks buildings for rehabilitation on the

basis of their location, type of structural framing, and number

of occupants. Rehabilitation of existing buildings is

performed in accordance with FEMA 356.

GSA conducts risk analyses of seismically deficient buildings

to assess their vulnerability and the costs of improving their

seismic performance through partial or complete retrofits.

Each such analysis yields a probable maximum loss (PML)

estimate, the maximum expected financial loss to the

structure from earthquake damage.The PML represents loss

on property in its current condition, without the benefit of

renovation or retrofit. Even though a building may not be in

compliance with GSA life-safety criteria, if the life-safety risk

for occupants is low, the building is deemed acceptable for

occupancy during the period of the analysis.The risk-analysis

tool helps in determining whether risks are acceptable for

occupancy when seismic mitigation must be delayed until

funds become available.

In mid-2004, GSA began installing 75 friction pendulum

isolators at the Pioneer Courthouse in Portland, Oregon.This

building, a 129-year-old national historic landmark, is the

second oldest federal courthouse west of the Mississippi River

and is ranked second in historic significance among GSA

buildings.When the work to seismically isolate and

rehabilitate the courthouse is complete, the structure will be

the first base-isolated federal building in the Pacific

Northwest.

In addition to its seismic work with federally owned

buildings, GSA has effectively applied seismic safety standards

to the privately owned, leased buildings within its purview.

GSA is responsible for about 63 percent of all privately owned

buildings leased by the Federal Government. Approximately

15 percent of the buildings leased by GSA are located in

regions with high seismicity. GSA includes language in all of

its new leases requiring building owners to meet the

requirements of ICSSC Recommended Practice 6, and GSA

engineers review and verify seismic certifications submitted

by owners’ engineers.

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National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory,Western

Ecology Division, Corvallis, Oregon.
63

GSA partnered with USGS to produce guidelines, revised in

November 2002, for installing seismic instrumentation in

buildings.The main objective of deploying seismic

instrumentation is to enhance understanding of the behavior

of structures and of their potential for sustaining damage

under the dynamic loads of earthquakes. Better understanding

can lead to new design and construction practices that can

reduce future earthquake damage. “Seismic Instrumentation

of Buildings,” the guidelines document prepared under this

joint GSA-USGS project, includes sample specifications for

seismic building instrumentation systems.

Department of Health and Human Services

The Department found seismic deficiencies at its IHS facilities

during 1999 and 2000.The total cost of correcting these

problems was estimated to be $149 million.Various strategies

have since been developed to correct the deficiencies,

including removing buildings from the Department’s

property inventory and incorporating structural and nonstructural seismic upgrades into all major renovation projects.

As a result, the deficiencies have been reduced by

approximately 33 percent over the past 4 years.

Department of the Interior

The overall seismic rehabilitation cost estimate that the

Department prepared in 1998 had two components: costs

developed for each deficient building in high seismic zones,

and a statistical projection of high-zone costs to buildings in

moderate and low seismic zones. During FY 2003 and 2004,

the DOI Seismic Safety Program continued to extend the

inventorying, screening, and evaluating requirements of ICSSC

Recommended Practice 6 to buildings in moderate and low

seismic zones.This involves identifying seismically deficient

buildings in these zones and developing building-specific

rehabilitation cost estimates that are consistent with estimates

prepared for high-zone buildings.These new building-specific

estimates will replace the statistically projected rehabilitation

cost estimate for buildings in low and moderate zones.

DOI has actively pursued the mitigation of unacceptable

seismic risk in existing buildings, which is a specific

requirement of ICSSC Recommended Practice 6.The

Department has placed a high priority on addressing deferred

maintenance issues, including seismic safety issues, that affect

the health and safety of employees and the public. DOI has

framed this priority in budget guidance, requesting a 5-year

plan from each DOI bureau addressing, as a priority, critical

health and safety deferred maintenance.These plans will

include the rehabilitation of high-risk buildings identified

pursuant to Executive Order 12941.

Mitigation designs for the Department’s highest-risk buildings

were initiated in FY 1999, and a specific funding plan is in

place that allows mitigation resources to be directed to these

structures. DOI has developed a risk-based methodology that

determines the mitigation priority of all buildings found to

be seismically deficient.This innovative approach has allowed

the Department to move quickly to initiate seismic risk

reduction projects at the highest-priority facilities as funding

permits.

The Department’s seismic safety coordinators manage

meetings of the DOI Seismic Safety Team, which includes

seismic safety contacts from each bureau.The U.S. Forest

Service and IHS have also participated in Team meetings.

Meeting agendas encompass general coordination, resource

sharing, training, compliance, Seismic Safety Program

implementation, program annual reports, and bureau status

reports.The Team has met with and made presentations to

seismic safety program directors from the State of California,

the Salt Lake City School District, and the City of Seattle, and

has met with numerous service providers and manufacturers

of seismic restraints.

Department of Labor

During FY 2003 and 2004, the Department of Labor’s seismic

safety activities related to buildings that it owned and leased

for the Employment and Training Administration’s (ETA) Job

Corps program. Before buildings are purchased for the Job

Corps, ETA evaluates their seismic safety and forwards its

findings and recommendations, including cost estimates for

any required mitigation, to the Department for review. ETA

monitors planned renovations of leased facilities to determine

whether accompanying seismic upgrades are required, and

reviews upcoming lease renewals to determine whether the

lessor must complete mitigation work or certify seismic

compliance before the Department can renew the lease.

ETA completed detailed seismic analyses of Job Corps facilities

that were unable to be exempted from such scrutiny through

earlier screening performed under Executive Order 12941.

These analyses, comprising FEMA 310 evaluations and

preparation of mitigation recommendations, were performed

at five Job Corps centers.The buildings found to require

mitigation and the mitigation strategies pursued are described

below for each center.

• Memphis Job Corps Center—An A&E firm has begun

preparing mitigation designs for the Center’s main

building and gymnasium.

• Los Angeles Job Corps Center—Buildings 1 (main), 2

(education), 3 (business, education), and 4 (residential)

were found to be in need of seismic mitigation.The

Center has decided to vacate these structures and find

alternate facilities in cooperation with the lessor.
• Sacramento Job Corps Center—A contract has been

awarded to demolish and replace the gymnasium.

• Sierra Nevada Job Corps Center—A project has been

funded to design seismic upgrades for Buildings 11

(Donner Hall), 15 (Washoe Hall), 18 (Lassen Hall), 19

(Comstock Hall), 20 (Fremont Hall), 21 (Carson Hall),

22 (cafeteria), and 31 (theater).

• Cascades Job Corps Center—The lessor, the State of

Washington, has agreed to let contracts to design and

install seismic upgrades for Buildings 24 and 28; the

Department of Labor will contribute funds toward this

work.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

During the late 1970s and the 1980s, NASA implemented a

seismic safety review process in areas of high seismicity and

modified many existing buildings. Since then, NASA has

continued these efforts by programming facility revitalization

projects that comply with current building codes and seismic

standards. Seismic safety has remained a prime consideration

among facility engineers at NASA centers located in

vulnerable areas. NASA has also continued to work with

FEMA, the ICSSC, and other agencies in developing seismic

evaluation methodologies and proposed Executive Orders.

Since NASA incorporated the requirements of Executive Order

12941 into the “NASA Facilities Program Implementation

Requirements” policy document, its centers have continued to

respond by evaluating existing buildings and determining

which require seismic upgrades or replacement. Mitigation

projects are considered in NASA’s yearly budget deliberations.

Despite the budget constraints it has faced, NASA has

maintained a prudent course of identifying and upgrading

facilities that may present unwarranted risks from seismically

induced hazards. Buildings leased by NASA are required to

comply with seismic safety standards before the lease is

executed.

In FY 2003, NASA completed a seismic survey of facilities at

the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. In

2004, NASA prepared a preliminary engineering report

concerning seismic upgrades for a tall office building at JPL

that was initially evaluated in FY 2002. On the basis of these

studies, NASA decided to replace this building. NASA also

completed construction documents for the seismic retrofit of

another building at JPL and made plans to seek bids for the

project in FY 2005.

At the Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California,

NASA completed seismic upgrades in two buildings; these

projects were initiated in FY 2002 and FY 2003. In FY 2004,

NASA began seismically strengthening two more buildings at

the Center and made plans to upgrade another building in FY

2005. NASA has also hired consulting engineers to evaluate

three more buildings at the Center, and will budget funds for

seismic upgrades as needed.

Department of the Navy

In October 2003, DoN issued NAVFAC Instruction 11000.40

to update and promulgate DoN seismic safety policy.This

instruction adopted ICSSC Recommended Practice 6 as the

minimum acceptable seismic standard for the Department’s

existing owned and leased buildings within the United States,

its territories, and possessions.

Department of Veterans Affairs

The Department has been evaluating and mitigating seismic

risk at its health care facilities since the mid-1970s. In

response to Executive Order 12941,VA has combined the risk

data that it had already developed with data generated

through additional screening and evaluation studies

(including detailed studies of 220 buildings), to create an

extensive building inventory containing detailed

infrastructure and seismic risk data.

Of the 6,000 buildings in the VA inventory, 700 are subject to

some level of seismic risk. Of those 700 structures, 150 have

been designated as high-risk and 75 as EHR. Buildings subject

to high or exceptionally high risk are ranked individually by

severity of risk in the inventory.The inventory is being used

to develop project-level mitigation cost estimates for

incorporation into VA’s major construction program.

64

In FY 2003, NASA completed a seismic survey of facilities at the JPL in

Pasadena, California.
At the close of FY 2004, 12 seismic mitigation projects were

under way or had recently been completed in Puerto Rico

and California, Montana, Oregon, and Washington. Each of

these projects is listed below along with its status at the end

of the fiscal year.

• VA Long Beach Healthcare System, Long Beach,

California—The retrofit for Building 133 (nursing home)

was being designed, and A&E firms were being selected

for the Building 7 (wards and clinic) and Building

126OP (outpatient facilities) work.

• VA Palo Alto Health Care System, Menlo Park Division,

Menlo Park, California—Building 137 (psychiatric

facilities) was scheduled to be demolished and Building

324 (wards and administrative offices) to be replaced.

• VA Palo Alto Health Care System, Palo Alto Division, Palo

Alto, California—A&E firms were being sought for the

Building 2 (psychiatric facilities) and Building 4

(research facilities) retrofits, and seismic upgrades had

been completed in Buildings 23 (therapeutic

gymnasium) and 40 (boiler house).

• Sacramento VA Medical Center, Mather, California—A

construction contract had been issued for the Building

650 (hospital) retrofit.

• VA San Diego Healthcare System, San Diego, California—

Seismic design work was underway for Building 1

(medical center).

• San Francisco VA Medical Center, San Francisco,

California—The design work for Building 203 (inpatient

hospital) was in progress.

• Sepulveda Ambulatory Care Center and Nursing Home,

Sepulveda, California—Seismic construction had been

completed in Building 99 (nursing home).

• West Los Angeles Healthcare Center, Los Angeles,

California—Retrofits were being designed for Buildings

114 (research laboratory) and 500 (main hospital).

• VA Montana Health Care System, Fort Harrison,

Montana—Work had been completed on Building 154A

(outpatient clinic).

• Portland VA Medical Center, Portland, Oregon—

Construction was set to begin on the upgrades for

Buildings 6 (research facilities) and 16 (research and

administrative facilities).

• San Juan VA Medical Center, San Juan, Puerto Rico—A&E

selection was in process for work on Building 1 (main

hospital).

• VA Puget Sound Health Care System, American Lake

Division,Tacoma,Washington—Seismic upgrades were

under construction in Buildings 6 (domiciliary), 61

(mental health facilities), and 85 (mental health

facilities).

As these projects indicate,VA has made seismic safety an

important goal for its health care facility managers and has

aggressively supported construction funding for the

rehabilitation of seismically deficient buildings.The

Department has issued a seismic safety directive mandating

specific organizational responsibilities and directing facility

managers to develop strategic plans to address seismically atrisk facilities.

VA owns the National Strong Motion Instrumentation

Network, which records and analyzes seismic activity through

85 recording systems located at 60 VA medical centers around

the country. USGS operates and maintains this network under

an interagency agreement with VA. Recently,VA had USGS

replace the old analog strong motion instruments at 45

medical centers with more sophisticated digital instruments.

VA has continued to participate, along with FEMA, ICSSC, and

the BSSC, in the development of seismic standards, code

comparisons, and data collection initiatives.The manager of

VA’s seismic program routinely attends related conferences

and keeps up with the state of the art in seismic risk analysis

and mitigation.

65
On October 25, 2004, Congress enacted the Earthquake

Hazards Reduction Authorization Act of 2004, Public Law

108-360. Public Law 108-360 provides for a number of

changes affecting the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction

Program (NEHRP) starting in Fiscal Year (FY) 2005, including

the transfer of lead agency status over the NEHRP from the

Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to the

National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

Another significant change is the requirement that NIST

establish an Advisory Committee on Earthquake Hazards

Reduction. The Advisory Committee, which will be

comprised of representatives from research and academic

institutions, industry standards development organizations,

state and local government, and financial communities, will

make recommendations to the NEHRP agencies in

implementing the Program. Beginning in FY 2005, these

recommendations will be included in an annual report to the

Congress, rather than a biennial report, on NEHRP progress.

The Strategic Plan for the NEHRP for 2001-2005, Expanding and Using

Knowledge To Reduce Earthquake Losses (Strategic Plan) articulates the

mission and the four primary goals of the NEHRP, provides a 

framework for priority-setting and coordinating activities, and

defines priority areas for the future. In FY 2004, the NEHRP

Interagency Coordinating Committee (ICC) established a

Subcommittee on Performance Measures. By the end of FY

2005, the ICC Subcommittee will have established

performance measures for the NEHRP based on the mission,

goals, objectives, and priorities in the Strategic Plan. These

performance measures will serve as the foundation for

updating the Strategic Plan and will provide the basis for both

assessing progress and establishing priorities and future

direction of the NEHRP.

Over the next year, the NEHRP agencies will continue to build

on the projects and initiatives described in Section II of this

report. Recent events also will bring a new focus to some of

the NEHRP agencies’ priorities and future directions, some of

which are described below.

Federal Emergency Management Agency

In response to the magnitude 6.5 San Simeon earthquake on

December 22, 2003, the California Office of Emergency

Services used FEMA’s HAZUS software program, in

66

This photos was taken on a survey along and near the Denali fault after Alaska’s Nov. magnitude 3 7.9 earthquake. (USGS)

IV. Future Directions
conjunction with a ShakeMap produced by the U.S. Geological

Survey (USGS), as the basis for arriving at loss estimation

within 1 hour of the event.

In the 8 years since FEMA published the prototype earthquake

edition HAZUS97, HAZUS has helped communities across the

United States identify and plan for earthquakes by giving

them access to specialized databases and GIS-based analytic

tools.

The FEMA HAZUS earthquake loss estimation methodology

uses mathematical formulas and information about building

stock, local geology, the location and size of potential

earthquakes, economic data, and other information to

estimate losses from a potential earthquake. HAZUS uses

ArcGIS to map and display ground shaking, the pattern of

building damage, and demographic information about a

community. Once the location and size of a hypothetical

earthquake is identified, HAZUS estimates:

• ground shaking 

• the number of buildings damaged 

• the number of casualties 

• the amount of damage to transportation systems 

• disruption to the electrical and water utilities 

• the number of people displaced from their homes 

• the cost of repairing projected damage and other effects 

In FY 2005, FEMA's Mitigation Division released HAZUS-MH

MR1 (HAZUS-MH Version 1.1), an updated and revised

version of HAZUS-MH that includes a sixth edition of the

HAZUS Earthquake Model. In addition to providing estimates

of damage to property, hospitals, fire and police stations,

schools, bridges and other transportation facilities, and

utilities, the Earthquake Model addresses building debris

generation, fires that occur after earthquakes, casualties,

shelter requirements, and economic losses. HAZUS-MH MR1

features faster runtimes for supporting rapid loss estimation

during earthquake response operations, a capability to add

specialized local building types to the earthquake analysis,

updated third-party software platforms, and numerous

improvements based on user input. A FEMA priority is to

continue to update HAZUS to best meet the needs of the

public and decision-makers in preparing for and responding

to earthquakes and other natural disasters.

National Institutes of Standards and Technology

For over 100 years, the Nation has relied upon NIST for

scientific and technical expertise, not only to enhance national

security but to promote economic growth, commerce, and

trade. In times of war or other national emergencies, NIST

scientists and engineers have stepped forward with a vast

array of expertise and knowledge in areas as diverse as radio

transmission and forensic DNA typing.

Through approximately 120 ongoing and newly initiated

research and standards development projects, NIST is helping

law enforcement, the military, emergency services,

information technology, airport and building security, and

other areas protect the American public from terrorist threats.

Similar to earthquake hazard reduction, an essential tool in

responding to extreme events is a solidly built and protected

infrastructure. NIST is contributing to this goal through

projects focused on strengthening the safety and security of

buildings and the physical infrastructure.

In August 2002, NIST launched a $16 million, multi-year

federal building and fire safety investigation of the World

Trade Center disaster.The study of World Trade Center

Buildings 1 and 2 and World Trade Center Building 7 is

focusing on the building construction, the materials used, and

all of the technical conditions that contributed to the

outcome of the World Trade Center disaster. Similar to most

of NIST's work, this project is a partnership with many

organizations and world-class experts. From this study, NIST

expects to learn-and pass on-many lessons in several different

areas, including structural fire protection, life safety, and

engineering practice. These broader R&D and dissemination

efforts will focus on using the results of the World Trade

Center investigation to develop cost-effective solutions to

improve the safety of existing and future buildings against

extreme events such as fires, attacks, and natural disasters,

including earthquakes. NIST will release the final investigation

report on World Trade Center Buildings 1 and 2 in April or

May 2005. The WTC 7 report will be issued as a supplement

to the main report, with a draft issued in May and the final in

July 2005.

These NIST efforts also will help provide a better

understanding of how emergency responders and building

occupants behave in a crisis, and to use the lessons learned to

help occupants survive future disasters and enable emergency

responders to do their jobs more safely and effectively. NIST

expects to engage leaders of the construction and building

community in the implementation of proposed changes to

practices, standards, and codes. Guidance and practices based

on this study will be disseminated broadly to standards and

code-developing organizations and to state and local agencies.

67
NIST believes the resulting code reforms will further protect

property and save lives, as well as provide better emergency

response capabilities and procedures in future disasters.

National Science Foundation 

The December 26, 2004, tsunami in South Asia is one

example of how the NEHRP agencies can rapidly focus their

efforts to respond to events and look to the future to reduce

the impacts of these events. With the appropriate

information, communities and nations can characterize risks

and determine how best to allocate resources for detection,

warning, and preparedness. The National Science Foundation

(NSF), in cooperation with the world research community,

will continue to generate new knowledge about the natural

phenomena of earthquakes and tsunamis, the design of better

coastal structures, the development of early warning and

response systems that can mitigate loss of life, and recovery

from such disasters.

NSF has long funded scientific and engineering research

infrastructure to detect and understand the impacts of

earthquakes, tsunamis, and other phenomena. Prominent

examples include the real-time Global Seismographic

Network (GSN), the data from which forged the critical core

of the early warning of the December 26, 2004, earthquake.

This Network, operated by the Incorporated Research

Institutions for Seismology (IRIS), is funded in partnership by

NSF and the USGS, and is the primary international source of

data for earthquake location and tsunami warning.

NSF also funds research designed to support damage and loss

prediction and avoidance for the United States and elsewhere,

including earthquake and tsunami effects on buildings,

bridges, and critical infrastructure systems, and estimates of

economic consequences, human and societal impacts, and

emergency response. NSF recently established the George E.

Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation

(NEES), a major national infrastructure project to create a

complete system of test facilities.The project is

revolutionizing earthquake-engineering research. NSF-funded

researchers create physical and computational simulations to

study how earthquakes and tsunamis affect buildings, bridges,

ports, and other critical infrastructure.The NEES Tsunami

Wave Basin at Oregon State University is now the world’s

most comprehensive facility for studying tsunamis and storm

waves.

U.S. Geological Survey

During the past year, more than 27 major disasters were

declared in the United States from earthquakes, landslides,

storms, fires, and floods.The year ended with the tragic

tsunami in the Indian Ocean, triggered by a magnitude 9

earthquake off the coast of Sumatra. As part of a 2-year

commitment by the Administration to expand tsunami

detection and monitoring to protect residents in the U.S. and

its territories, the USGS facilities and operations will provide

more robust detection and notification of earthquakes that

could trigger tsunamis. USGS will conduct this effort in

partnership with National Oceanic and Atmospheric

Administration (NOAA). USGS also will enhance its volcano

monitoring program and will maintain a strong landslide

program to provide advance warnings of potential debris flow

and landslides.

As part of the Administration’s plan to improve the safety of

the United States, the USGS also will increase its ability to

rapidly determine the location, size, and depth of large

earthquakes; improve landslide models and alert systems;

improve monitoring of the most dangerous volcanoes in the

United States; and work with its partners to ensure timely

warnings for all geologic hazards.

The NEHRP is a very successful program that has significantly

improved our Nation’s ability to prepare for, respond to,

recover from, and mitigate earthquakes. The NEHRP will

succeed in meeting the challenges brought about by

earthquakes by continuing to combine the talents, expertise,

and energy of the NEHRP agencies and all of its partners. In

looking to the future, the NEHRP will play a critical role by

making the performance of our buildings and lifelines highly

measurable and predictable.This measurement and prediction

ability will provide the critical foundation upon which to

achieve specified levels of performance and seismic risk

reduction via workable and practicable solutions. The United

States, through the work of the NEHRP, will be safer and

more secure for it.

68
List of Acronyms

ACP Association of Contingency Planners

A/E Architect/Engineer; Architectural/Engineering

AHAB All Hazard Alert Broadcasting

ALA American Lifelines Alliance

ANSS Advanced National Seismic System

AOC Architect of the Capitol

API American Petroleum Institute

ASCE American Society of Civil Engineers

ATC Applied Technology Council

AWWA American Water Works Association

BOCA Building Officials and Code Administrators

BSSC Building Seismic Safety Council

CALTRANS California Department of Transportation

CEA California Earthquake Authority

CEPEC California Earthquake Prediction Evaluation

Council

CERI Center for Earthquake Research and Information

CPARM Contingency Planning and Recovery Managers

CREW Cascadia Region Earthquake Workgroup

CRSC Code Resource Support Committee

CUSEC Central United States Earthquake Consortium

DHS Department of Homeland Security

DHS&EM Division of Homeland Security and Emergency

Management (Alaska)

DNR Department of Natural Resources

DoD Department of Defense

DOE Department of Energy

DOGAMI Department of Geology and Mineral Industry

(Oregon)

DOI Department of Interior

DoN Department of the Navy

DOT Department of Transportation

DR Disaster Research Newsletter (NHRAIC)

DRB Disaster Resistant Business Program

EERC Earthquake Engineering Research Center

EERI Earthquake Engineering Research Institute

EHR Exceptionally High Risk

EMA Emergency Management Agency

EMD Emergency Management Division (Washington)

EMI Emergency Management Institute (FEMA)

EMPG Emergency Management Performance Grant

EPA Environmental Protection Agency

EPRI Electrical Power Research Institute

ETA Employment and Training Administration (DOL)

FEMA Federal Emergency Management Agency

FHWA Federal Highway Administration

FRP Fiber-Reinforced Polymer

FY Fiscal Year

GIS Geographic Information System

GPRA Government Performance and Results Act

GSA General Services Administration

HAZUS Hazards U.S.

HMGP Hazard Mitigation Grant Program

69
HSEAC Hawaii State Earthquake Advisory Committee

HUG HAZUS Users Group

IAEM International Association of Emergency Managers

IBC International Building Code

IBHS Institute for Business and Home Safety

ICC International Code Council; Interagency

Coordinating Committee

ICDP International Continental Drilling Program

ICSSC Interagency Committee on Seismic Safety in

Construction

IHS Indian Health Service

InSAR Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar

IRC International Residential Code

IRIS Incorporated Research Institutions for

Seismology

ITR Information Technology Research

JPL Jet Propulsion Laboratory

LADWP Los Angeles Department of Water and Power

LANL Los Alamos National Laboratory

LRFD Load and Resistance Factor Design

LYS Lowe Yield Strength

MAE Center Mid-America Earthquake Center

MBDSI Multihazard Building Design Summer Institute

MCEER Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake

Engineering Research

MMC Multihazard Mitigation Council

NAS National Academy of Sciences

NASA National Aeronautical and Space Administration

NAVFAC Naval Facilities Engineering Command

NBC National Building Code

NCREE National Center for Research on Earthquake

Engineering

NEES Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation

NEHRP National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program

NEIC National Earthquake Information Center

NESEC Northeast States Emergency Consortium

NFPA National Fire Protection Association

NHRAIC Natural Hazards Research and Applications

Information Center

NIBS National Institute of Building Sciences

NIST National Institute of Standards and Technology

NJGS New Jersey Geological Survey

NMSZ New Madrid Seismic Zone

NOAA National Oceanic and Atmospheric

Administration

NPH Natural Phenomena Hazards, DOE

NRC Nuclear Regulatory Commission; National

Research Council

NSF National Science Foundation

NSMP National Strong Motion Program

NTHMP National Tsunami Hazard Mitigation Program

NYCEM New York Area Consortium for Earthquake Loss

Mitigation

OEM Oregon Emergency Management

OES Office of Emergency Services

OMB Office of Management and Budget

PDC Pacific Disaster Center

PEER Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center

PML Probable Maximum Loss

PRSEMA Puerto Rico State Emergency Management

Agency

70
QR Quick Response Research Reports (NHRAIC)

RBS Reduced Beam Sections

REDARS Risks from Earthquake Damage to Roadways

Systems Software

RPMS Real Property Management System

SAFOD San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth

SAVE Structural Assessment and Visual Evaluation

SBC Standard Building Code

SCD State Civil Defense (Hawaii)

SCEC Southern California Earthquake Center

SECC State Emergency Coordination Center (Alaska)

SEMA State Emergency Management Agency (Missouri)

SNL Sandia National Laboratory

SPW Sheer Plated Walls

SSC Seismic Safety Commission (Washington);

Structures, Systems and Components (DOE)

TIME Tsunami Inundation Mapping Effort

TVA Tennessee Valley Authority

UAF/GI University of Alaska Fairbanks, Geophysical

Institute

UBC Uniform Building Code

UFC Unified Facilities Criteria

UJNR U.S.-Japan Joint Panel on Wind and Seismic

Effects

USACE United States Army Corps of Engineers

USGS U.S. Geological Survey

USNSN U.S. National Seismograph Network

UT University of Texas

VA Department of Veterans Affairs

VIEWS Visualizing Earthquake Impacts with Satellite

Imagery

WECC Western Electricity Coordinating Council

WMD Weapons of Mass Destruction

WSSPC Western States Seismic Policy Council

71
Executive Order 12699: Seismic

Safety of Federal and Federally

Assisted or Regulated New

Building Construction

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution

and laws of the United States of America, and in furtherance

of the Earthquake Hazards Reduction Act of 1977, as

amended (42 U.S.C. 7701 et seq.), which requires that

Federal preparedness and mitigation activities are to include

“development and promulgation of specifications, building

standards, design criteria, and construction practices to

achieve appropriate earthquake resistance for new...

structures,” and “an examination of alternative provisions and

requirements for reducing earthquake hazards through

Federal and federally financed construction, loans, loan

guarantees, and licenses...” (42 U.S.C. 7704(f)(3, 4)), it is

hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. Requirements for Earthquake Safety of New Federal

Buildings

The purposes of these requirements are to reduce risks to the

lives of occupants of buildings owned by the Federal

Government and to persons who would be affected by the

failures of Federal buildings in earthquakes, to improve the

capability of essential Federal buildings to function during or

after an earthquake, and to reduce earthquake losses of public

buildings, all in a cost-effective manner. A building means any

structure, fully or partially enclosed, used or intended for

sheltering persons or property.

Each Federal agency responsible for the design and

construction of each new Federal building shall ensure that

the building is designed and constructed in accord with

appropriate seismic design and construction standards.This

requirement pertains to all building projects for which

development of detailed plans and specifications is initiated

subsequent to the issuance of the order. Seismic design and

construction standards shall be adopted for agency use in

accord with sections 3(a) and 4(a) of this order.

Section 2. Federally Leased, Assisted, or Regulated Buildings

The purposes of these requirements are to reduce risks to the

lives of occupants of buildings leased for Federal uses or

purchased or constructed with Federal assistance, to reduce

risks to the lives of persons who would be affected by

earthquake failures of federally assisted or regulated buildings,

and to protect public investments, all in a cost-effective

manner.The provisions of this order shall apply to all the new

construction activities specified in the subsections below.

(a) Space Leased for Federal Occupancy. Each Federal agency

responsible for the construction and lease of a new building

for Federal use shall ensure that the building is designed and

constructed in accord with appropriate seismic design and

construction standards.This requirement pertains to all leased

building projects for which the agreement covering

development of detailed plans and specifications is effected

subsequent to the issuance of this order. Local building codes

shall be used in design and construction by those concerned

with such activities in accord with section 3(a) and 3(c) of

this order and augmented when necessary to achieve

appropriate seismic design and construction standards.

(b) Federal Domestic Assistance Programs. Each Federal

agency assisting in the financing, through Federal grants or

loans, or guaranteeing the financing, through loan or

mortgage insurance programs, of newly constructed buildings

shall plan, and shall initiate no later than 3 years subsequent

to the issuance of this order, measures consistent with section

3(a) of this order, to assure appropriate consideration of

seismic safety.

(c) Federally Regulated Buildings. Each Federal agency with

generic responsibility for regulating the structural safety of

buildings shall plan to require use of appropriate seismic

design and construction standards for new buildings within

the agency’s purview. Implementation of the plan shall be

initiated no later than 3 years subsequent to the issuance of

this order.

Section 3. Concurrent Requirements

(a) In accord with Office of Management and Budget Circular

A - 119 of January 17, 1980, entitled “Federal Participation in

the Development and Use of Voluntary Standards,” nationally

recognized private sector standards and practices shall be used

for the purposes identified in sections 1 and 2 above unless

the responsible agency finds that none is available that meets

its requirements.The actions ordered herein shall consider the

seismic hazards in various areas of the country to be as

shown in the most recent edition of the American National

Standards Institute Standards A58, Minimum Design Loans for

Buildings and Other Structures, or subsequent maps adopted

for Federal use in accord with this order. Local building codes

determined by the responsible agency or by the Interagency

Committee for Seismic Safety in Construction to provide

adequately for seismic safety, or special seismic standards and

practices required by unique agency mission needs, may be

used.

(b) All orders, regulations, circulars, or other directives

issued, and all other actions taken prior to the date of this

order that meet the requirements of this order, are hereby

confirmed and ratified and shall be deemed to have been

issued under this order.

72
(c) Federal agencies that are as of this date requiring seismic

safety levels that are higher than those imposed by this order

in their assigned new building construction programs shall

continue to maintain in force such levels.

(d) Nothing in this order shall apply to assistance provided

for emergency work essential to save lives and protect

property and public health and safety, performed pursuant to

Sections 402, 403, 502, and 503 of the Robert T. Stafford

Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (Stafford Act)

(42 U.S.C. 5170a, 5170b, 5192, and 5193), or for temporary

housing assistance programs and individual and family grants

performed pursuant to Sections 408 and 411 of the Stafford

Act (42 U.S.C. 5174 and 5178). However, this order shall

apply to other provisions of the Stafford Act after a

presidentially declared major disaster or emergency when

assistance actions involve new construction or total

replacement of a building. Grantees and subgrantees shall be

encouraged to adopt the standards established in section 3(a)

of this order for use when the construction does not involve

Federal funding as well as when Federal Emergency

Management Agency (FEMA) funding applies.

Section 4. Agency Responsibilities

(a) The Director of the Federal Emergency Management

Agency shall be responsible for reporting to the President on

the execution of this order and providing support for the

secretariat of the Interagency Committee on Seismic Safety in

Construction (ICSSC).The ICSSC, using consensus procedures,

shall be responsible to FEMA for the recommendation for

adoption of cost-effective seismic design and construction

standards and practices required by sections 1 and 2 of this

order. Participation in ICSSC shall be open to all agencies with

programs affected by this order.

(b) To the extent permitted by law, each agency shall issue or

amend existing regulations or procedures to comply with this

order within 3 years of its issuance and plan for their

implementation through the usual budget process.Thereafter,

each agency shall review, within a period not to exceed 3

years, its regulations or procedures to assess the need to

incorporate new or revised standards and practices.

Section 5. Reporting

The Federal Emergency Management Agency shall request,

from each agency affected by this order, information on the

status of its procedures, progress in its implementation plan,

and the impact of this order on its operations.The FEMA shall

include an assessment of the execution of this order in its

annual report to the Congress on the National Earthquake

Hazards Reduction Program.

Section 6. Judicial Review

Nothing in this order is intended to create any right or

benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law by a

party against the United States, its agencies, its officers, or any

person.

George H.W. Bush

The White House

January 5, 1990

73
Executive Order 12941: Seismic

Safety of Existing Federally

Owned or Leased Buildings

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution

and laws of the United States of America, and in furtherance

of the Earthquake Hazards Reduction Act of 1977, as

amended by Public Law 101-614, which requires the

President to adopt “standards for assessing and enhancing the

seismic safety of existing buildings constructed for or leased

by the Federal Government which were designed and

constructed without adequate seismic design and

construction standards” (42 U.S.C. 7705b(a)), it is hereby

ordered as follows:

Section 1. Adoption of Minimum Standards

The Standards of Seismic Safety for Existing Federally Owned

or Leased Buildings (Standards), developed, issued and

maintained by the Interagency Committee on Seismic Safety

in Construction (ICSSC), are hereby adopted as the minimum

level acceptable for use by Federal departments and agencies

in assessing the seismic safety of their owned and leased

buildings and in mitigating unacceptable seismic risks in

those buildings.The Standards shall be applied, at a

minimum, to those buildings identified in the Standards as

requiring evaluation and, if necessary, mitigation. Evaluations

and mitigations that were completed prior to the date of this

order under agency programs that were based on standards

deemed adequate and appropriate by the individual agency

need not be reconsidered unless otherwise stipulated by the

Standards. For the purposes of this order, buildings are

defined as any structure, fully or partially enclosed, located

within the United States as defined in the Earthquake Hazards

Reduction Act of 1977, as amended, (42 U.S.C. 7703 (5)),

used or intended for sheltering persons or property, except

for the exclusions specified in the Standards.

Section 2. Estimating Costs of Mitigation

Each agency that owns or leases buildings for Federal use

shall, within 4 years of the issuance of this order, develop an

inventory of their owned and leased buildings and shall

estimate the costs of mitigating unacceptable seismic risks in 

those buildings.The cost estimate shall be based on the

exemptions and evaluation and mitigation requirements in

the Standards. Guidance for the development of the inventory

and cost estimates will be issued by the ICSSC no later than 1

year after the signing of this order. Cost estimates with

supporting documentation shall be submitted to the Director

of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) no

later than 4 years after the signing of this order.

Section 3. Implementation Responsibilities

(a) The Federal Emergency Management Agency is responsible

for (1) notifying all Federal departments and agencies of the

existence and content of this order; (2) preparing for the

Congress, in consultation with the ICSSC, no later than 6 years

after the issuance of this order, a comprehensive report on

how to achieve an adequate level of seismic safety in federally

owned and leased buildings in an economically feasible

manner; and (3) preparing for the Congress on a biennial

basis, a report on the execution of this order.

(b) The National Institute of Standards and Technology is

responsible for providing technical assistance to the Federal

departments and agencies in the implementation of this order.

(c) Federal departments and agencies may request an

exemption from this order from the Director of the Office of

Management and Budget.

Section 4. Updating Programs

The ICSSC shall update the Standards at least every 5 years. It

shall also update the Standards within 2 years of the

publication of the first edition of FEMA’s Guidelines for

Seismic Rehabilitation of Buildings and Commentary.

Section 5. Judicial Review

Nothing in this order is intended to create any right to

administrative or judicial review, or any other right, benefit,

or trust responsibility, substantive or procedural, enforceable

at law by any party against the United States, its agencies or

instrumentalities, its officers or employees, or any person.

The White House

December 1, 1994

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