Cascadia Rising, an earthquake and tsunami exercise simulating a 9.0 quake in Western Washington, will take place later this year with Grays Harbor County as a focal point of exercises. Response plans, never in existence before, are being written and will be tested in June.

Chuck Wallace with the Grays Harbor County Emergency Management Agency said, “If this happens to our county maybe the coastal areas are no good, you know they’re not functional for a while. But part of Aberdeen still is [functional], Elma still is, McCleary, Oakville, Montesano, so how do we help you get back so that at least we could maybe move the forces closer to the areas that do need the assistance and how do we get those people out.”

The event is being coordinated through FEMA Region 10, and will provide every citizen, community, jurisdiction and response agency of the County, an opportunity to participate and work with Military, Federal, State and local response organizations in order to develop a robust plan for disaster response.

The Cascadia Subduction Zone (CSZ) earthquake and tsunami is one of the most complex disaster scenarios that emergency management and public safety officials face in the Pacific Northwest.

Wallace explained some of the challenges in preparing for a CSZ quake, “The Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake; you’re going to feel the ground shake, you’re going to rattle and roll, for a couple of minutes. You’re going to have some liquefaction where the ground becomes unstable, maybe water comes up through ground that you normally wouldn’t think of. There’s some subsidence where they believe that the coastal area is going to drop about 4 to 6 feet. And that will go all the way probably almost to the county line before it levels out again.” Wallace added that some areas we know, others we do not know what to expect. “Exactly, and then there are areas that you believe are okay, but there is landfill like the port has a lot of fill and they’re not really sure. They believe that there’s going to be some major structural damage there but we don’t know exactly. The goal is ‘How prepared are you today to handle this? What do you believe will happen? And What kind of help do you think you need to get back in service?’.” Wallace said they are not only looking at what-if, but what-then questions, like how do they rebuild after a major CSZ quake.

Wallace at CSZ 10X

The exercises are planned for June, but agencies have been working on these plans since before that interview in 2014. Watch the Grays Harbor County Emergency Management Agency’s website or their facebook page for updates later this year.