Prepare Yourself And Your Family

Identify Your Home’s Structural Weaknesses

Buildings are built to withstand the downward pull of gravity, yet earthquakes shake a building in all directions - up and down, but most of all, sideways. There are several common issues that can limit a building’s ability to withstand this sideways shaking.

• Inadequate foundations
  http://www.earthquakecountry.info/roots/step4.html
• Unbraced cripple walls
• Soft First Stories
• Unreinforced Masonry

To find out if your home needs to be retrofitted against earthquakes, the best place to start is at the home retrofit class for homeowners.

http://www.seattle.gov/emergency/info/retrofitclasses.htm

Additional Resources

• FEMA Mitigation Division
  http://www.fema.gov/about/divisions/mitigation.shtm

• Seattle Project Impact
  http://www.seattle.gov/emergency/programs/projectimpact

• Emergency Survival Program: Is Your Place Safe?
  http://www.scec.org/education/public/espfocus/May_06.pdf

• Professional Engineers for Small or Residential Projects -
  http://seaw.associationsonline.com/documents/Residential%20Engineer%20List.pdf

• Home Preparedness - Getting Ready
  http://www.emd.wa.gov/preparedness/prep_home.shtml

• How To Videos - YouTube EMD Prepare’s Channel
  http://www.youtube.com/user/EMDPrepare

Campus Resources

• UW Hazard Mitigation Plan
  http://www.washington.edu/emergency/mitigate/hmp

• UW Hazard Identification and Vulnerability Assessment (PDF) -
  http://www.washington.edu/emergency/files/documents/HIVA.pdf

• University of Washington Building Restoration and Renewal Prioritization Study, June 2004
  http://www.washington.edu/admin/pb/home/pdf/bldg-restor-final-study.pdf

• Capital Projects Office Project Tracking System
  http://www.cpo.washington.edu/PTS

• EH&S Capital Safety Projects
  http://www.ehs.washington.edu/fsocapproj/index.shtm

• Earthquake Readiness Advisory Committee report
  http://www.washington.edu/emergency/mitigate/erac