Battered Towns Try to Put Lives Back Together

At a local supermarket--not far from where the mall had collapsed in Tuesday’s earthquake and two had died--a quiet line of anxious shoppers stretched for several blocks Wednesday, waiting as long as three hours to stock up on candles, flashlight batteries and canned goods.

Max Spitzer, the manager of a neighborhood video store, said that to prevent hoarding, supermarket clerks were taking the shoppers’ lists and doing their marketing for them.

“It’s cash only,” he said. The massive cleanup and rebuilding efforts needed to restore some semblance of normal life here have yet to begin.

In the towns south of San Francisco that were hit hard by Tuesday’s massive quake--places like Santa Cruz and Los Gatos and to a lesser extent Hollister and San Jose--people were simply trying to pull their lives back together. Mostly, they were taking stock, assessing the damage and shopping for the suddenly important necessities needed to get through the next couple of days.

SANTA CRUZ

By far the greatest damage in Santa Cruz was to the Pacific Gardens Mall, a collection of shops in a string of renovated, turn-of-the century buildings, several blocks long, in the center of the city of 47,000.

At least two people died in the collapse of the more than 20 stores that Gary Patton, chairman of the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors, described as “the heart of the community and its vitality.”

Rescue teams using trained dogs searched through the rubble until nightfall Wednesday and police said they may still find more bodies.

Kellie Cronin, 18, said she and her 16-year-old sister, Maris George, were shopping in one of the stores Tuesday when the ground began to shudder. “We just flew out onto the street, screaming and crying,” Cronin said. “Then the whole thing just crashed.”

Cronin, cut on the face and arms by shattering glass, was among the 250 Santa Cruz residents injured in the temblor.

Besides the shops, dozens of other buildings in the city were damaged or destroyed, including mobile homes that slipped from their foundations and a number of houses that were broken and bent in a neighborhood adjacent to the downtown area. Another 120 homes suffered major damage in the mountains northeast of town, where major fissures opened in the earth.

“We’re just locking things up and staying with friends,” said Todd Shuman, a research assistant who lives on one of the devastated blocks in Santa Cruz. “When the quake was going, I stopped playing my sax, ran outside and saw all these chimneys coming down. I don’t think it’s safe.”

Much of the city was left without gas, electricity and fresh water. Hundreds of residents camped in their yards or slept in their cars, and officials said it could be days before the utility service is restored.

Despite ruptured pipes in his area, Santa Cruz resident Tom Dickershaid had plenty of drinking water. “Like most Californians, I’ve got a hot tub,” he said. “We filled it last week, but we haven’t put the chemicals in, so that’s our water supply.”

With most of the major roadways impassable, the city was virtually isolated.

California 17, the four-lane highway leading over the mountains to Los Gatos and San Jose, was blocked by rockslides and mudslides, had gaps in the pavement and splintered guardrails. The road was open to emergency vehicles only and to local residents with proof of residency.

California 1, the coastal highway leading north and south from the city, was closed in both directions by quake-damaged bridges and overpasses.

“People should stay home. Boil their water. Clean up and prepare for the long haul,” advised Dinah Phillips, a public information officer for Santa Cruz County.

Several minor injuries were reported at UC Santa Cruz, including bruises suffered when books toppled from shelves in the campus library. Some campus buildings had minor damage, and several thousand students camped outside Tuesday night until their dormitories were declared safe. They returned to their rooms before dawn Wednesday.

LOS GATOS

Almost as hard hit when it comes to property damage was Los Gatos. No one was killed, but 214 of the town’s 28,000 residents were treated for injuries.

About 30 buildings, businesses and homes among them, were declared uninhabitable. At least a dozen of them were landmark, Victorian-style homes.

Several of the structures burned, and firefighters said their efforts were hampered by damaged waterlines.

“There are so many leaks and breakages that if they increase the pressure, the (water) just comes out all over,” Fire Capt. Hal E. Chase Jr. said.

Water service was out Wednesday in much of the city, and officials urged residents who did have some to boil it.

Robin Clayton, 42, who purchased a $600,000 Victorian home five months ago, said the quake heaved the foundation under her porch up three feet and caved in part of the roof, shattering some stained glass windows.

Clayton said she did not have earthquake insurance because the house “went through the 1906 quake, so it seemed fine.”

“I don’t know what we’re going to do,” she added. “We’re mortgaged to the hilt. We’ll just try to rebuild.”

Clayton’s roommate, Susie Curtis, a law student at Santa Clara University, said she decided to stay inside the house when the quake hit because she wanted to save a term paper on a file in her computer.

As it turned out, she said, that decision may have saved her life. Had she run out the front door, she might have been buried under the collapsing roof.

Police kept many in Los Gatos from reentering their homes and businesses until the structures could be checked for damage. Several merchants said they will probably remain closed at least until Friday.

Les Stephenson, 40, owner of a local watering hole called Carrie Nation’s, said the floor of his bar was covered with glass from broken bottles, spilled liquor and overturned stools. Luckily, the structure itself appeared to be in pretty good shape.

“And the building is the main thing,” he said. “The booze is easy to replace.”

In an upscale commercial area centering on East Main Street, the roads were off limits to motor traffic. Stores were closed, and the sidewalks, some of them buckled by the quake, were empty.

But the place was not deserted. Sightseers on bicycles kept pedaling through as if on holiday.

HOLLISTER

In the farming community of Hollister, a town of about 16,500 that has gained a certain notoriety over the years as one of this nation’s major earthquake centers, the damage from the disaster was moderate.

Assemblyman Rusty Areias (D-Los Banos) speculated that was because “there were no tall buildings to fall down.”

“Nothing in the county is over four stories tall, and that’s a feed silo,” said Paul Penn, a representative from the State Office of Emergency Services. “Hollister was very lucky. There were no fatalities, and the property can always be replaced.”

Officials said 40 people were treated at a hospital for minor injuries. Six homes and six businesses in the town were destroyed, and hundreds of additional structures were damaged.

Dorothy Blackie’s house, built in the 1890s and a survivor of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, slid off its foundation Tuesday.

“I just sat there,” the elderly woman said Wednesday. “The house was going up and down, around and around, 90 m.p.h. There wasn’t much I could do.”

The front of the red brick Odd Fellows Hall collapsed, crushing three cars parked in front, but few other vehicles were damaged.

Officials said while the town seemed to have fared pretty well, it was still without water or electricity 24 hours after the quake.

“Water is the big problem right now,” said David Edge, administrative officer for San Benito County. Edge said water and portable toilets were being trucked to local schools for use by residents until the utilities are restored.

While no one in Hollister has been killed in a quake since the one that leveled San Francisco in 1906, the town is still known as the World’s Earthquake Capital.

Straddling a number of active faults, including the mighty San Andreas, the town is hit by hundreds of small earthquakes every year and has become one of the major centers for on-site seismic research.

SAN JOSE

The city of San Jose came through the quake “remarkably well,” according to Pat Dando, a city spokesman.

More than 300 of the city’s 728,000 residents were injured, but most of the injuries were minor, the results of shattering glass and flying debris. A number of commercial and residential buildings were damaged, but none was destroyed.

Scattered power outages were reported throughout the city.

Four cities--Santa Cruz, Los Gatos, Hollister and San Jose--were among the hardest hit south of San Francisco. While only two people died in those communities, hundreds more were injured and hundreds of buildings were destroyed or damaged.

A number of major highways were blocked by rockslides and gaps in the pavement, electrical service was blacked out over widespread areas and sewer and water lines were ruptured.

Residents were being asked to sit tight, conserve food and water and await studies to determine the full extent of the damage before the expensive and lengthy task of rebuilding the communities can begin.