Quake Does Little Harm, but It Jogs the Memory

As soon as the jolt struck his Mobil station in Montebello, the epicenter of Monday’s earthquake, Al Louie went into his emergency routine: He turned off the gasoline pumps, checked the station for damage, then took off in his car.

First stop was his house five miles away, where his wife was in the yard watering the grass, “so I knew everything was OK.” Then he drove by Schurr High School, where one of his four children is a student. “Everybody was out in the field, so I figured it was OK, too,” he said.

There were, indeed, no reports of serious damage or injuries in the epicenter area. But Montebello and the surrounding communities are just west of Whittier, where the region’s last major earthquake caused extensive damage in 1987, and the latest temblor brought back frightening memories for residents.

Two hours after Monday’s quake and its sharp aftershock, Cora Valeriano kept the door to the courtyard open at the De Paul Center, a 14-acre Montebello compound for religious retreats.

The 1987 shaker severely damaged the center’s brick chapel and gym and toppled a marble statue of St. Vincent, whose head was severed when it hit the ground, smashing through the glass door before rolling to a stop in front of Valeriano’s office.

“This one scared the heck out of us,” she said Monday. “When it hit, I just held onto the door frame. And as soon as it settled down, we ran outside.”

Valeriano, a secretary at the center, spent the next hour outside with several other employees, taking no chances. The facility was being used Monday for the annual retreat of eighth graders from St. Bruno’s, a Roman Catholic school in Whittier. “These kids were through the worst of it the last time,” Valeriano said.

When Monday’s 4.5-magnitude quake struck, the youngsters were starting a “trust walk,” an interpersonal exercise in which they close their eyes while being escorted through the grounds by partners.

Under a Walkway

“We were under this walkway thing when it started shaking,” said Rudy Ceniseroz, 14, pointing to a structure between two buildings, supported by columns.

“I tried to run because I thought it was going to fall,” said classmate Chris Gorny. “We immediately think, ‘Get to a grassy area.’ ”

Teachers quickly gathered them on a lawn for a “count-off.” After all 27 students were accounted for, the students fell into giggling banter--boys insisting that the girls were the only ones scared and the girls responding, “Yeah, right.”

“The kids are fine,” concluded Judee Mattson, religious education director at the school. “The adults are not so fine.”

Reports were similar in surrounding communities. At the Uptown Preschool in central Whittier, director Alice De Leon reported that excited students dived under the tables, shouting: “Oh good, it’s an earthquake!”

“People in our area have been more vigilant--if not hypervigilant,” said Albert H. Arenowitz of the Intercommunity Child Guidance Center in Whittier, which counseled several hundred people after the October, 1987, quake.

“They do their drills, they keep their flashlights at their bedside,” he said. “From a psychological point of view, if you are prepared, I think your anxiety level won’t be quite as high.”

But several miles to the west, in Bell, Vickie Moon became one of the day’s minor casualties when she cut two fingers trying to hide under a counter in a Purity liquor store and market.

“The last time, many friends were hurt in Whittier when things fell on them,” she said. “This time we were the center. I was scared.”

A block down Gage Avenue, 300-pound Jesse Gonzales stunned a dozen other people washing their clothes at a laundry when he bolted out the door to safety. “I was the first one out of there,” he said. “They didn’t think I could move that fast.”

Times staff writer Mary Lou Fulton contributed to this story