Temblor Strikes Fear Into Baseball Fans at the Series

Benjamin Young of San Francisco was in a perilous position when a major earthquake rocked Candlestick Park on Tuesday evening just before the start of Game 3 of the World Series.

Young was about 100 feet in the air, suspended on a light fixture he was doctoring. He had volunteered to climb up to the light after one of the decorative wind socks bearing the San Francisco Giants’ colors became hooked onto the fixture.

But as soon as he reached the top, the earthquake hit.

“I went to my knees and hung on for dear life,” he said after he was safely on the ground. “I was so scared I (was sick). It was the most frightening thing I’ve ever experienced. The thing just swayed and swayed. I thought I was a goner.”

Young was not alone. Baseball fans, still reeling from the effects of the jolt, said Tuesday at Candlestick it was one of the most frightening incidents they had experienced.

However, little panic was reported, and most fans calmly left the stadium once the game was officially canceled about 6 p.m.

“I was in the very end box in the very top of stadium,” said Timothy Buffield, an actor on the television show “thirtysomething.” “It wasn’t as bad as the L.A. quake (centered in Whittier) because . . . it woke me up in the middle of the night. But this was bad.”

Fans sitting in the upper tiers of Candlestick, located at the south end of San Francisco, said they felt the stadium sway during the 15-second jolt.

“I could see people walking and they were walking crooked,” said Tim Montgomery of San Mateo, a fan who was buying a soft drink when the rattling began. “It really shook us up there.”

Richard Tarnetzer, who left the Bay Area to move to Salem, Ore., said: “I just moved there and I’m glad I did. I’m going back there fast.”

Steve Hurst, an ABC-TV statistician who was working in the announcers’ booth, said he thought at first that the fans were stomping in their seats.

“Then we realized it was a quake and then suddenly we went off the air,” he said.