BAY AREA QUAKE : Governor Removes Top Quake Expert : Safety: Engineer’s objectivity became an issue. Meanwhile, questions arise about earlier freeway studies.

SACRAMENTO — Expressing concern about his appointee’s objectivity, Gov. George Deukmejian on Monday abruptly rescinded his selection of a New York-based earthquake expert to head a special panel that will investigate the collapse of the Nimitz Freeway in Oakland.

At the same time, it was disclosed that Deukmejian’s chief adviser on transportation issues did not forward to the governor a report two years ago warning that “key structures on major freeways” could suffer “catastrophic collapse” in an earthquake. However, the governor and the Legislature later authorized the start of a $64-million program to make these highway structures safer in earthquakes.

Transportation officials also said they cannot find a copy of a seismic study conducted in 1977 of the section of freeway that collapsed. The missing study could show what the state knew about the freeway’s ability to withstand a major quake.

At an impromptu press conference, Deukmejian said he removed Ian G. Buckle as head of his special investigative team to examine the Nimitz collapse because of fears that Buckle, who is deputy director of the National Center for Earthquake Engineering Research in Buffalo, N.Y., might already have decided that the state Department of Transportation was not to blame for the fall of the double-deck freeway in last Tuesday’s quake.

In an article Buckle wrote for The Times’ opinion page that was published Thursday, the State University of New York professor said Caltrans engineers had done their best to protect the state’s elevated freeways and bridges against earthquake damage and concluded that “now is not the time for knocking Caltrans.”

In place of Buckle, Deukmejian pledged to appoint “someone recognized as very credible” to direct a team that “will be totally fair, totally impartial and totally independent.”

L. Thomas Tobin, executive director of the state Seismic Safety Commission, said he does not know Buckle and has “no opinion” on his qualifications. But he confirmed that some engineers were concerned about the appointment.

“I would like to see people on that panel who are knowledgeable and independent, because I think it is important that the results stand whatever test they are put to, whether it be political, legal or engineering,” Tobin said.

Wilfred Iwan, a Caltech professor and member of the Seismic Safety Commission, said that whoever heads the investigation ought to have “the highest credentials possible so that their findings will be accepted and listened to by everybody.

“We need a panel with stature that is unquestioned and people whose conclusions will not be questioned,” Iwan said.

Although the special task force is to investigate the performance of Caltrans, Deukmejian chose Buckle on the recommendation of the department’s engineers, who were familiar with Buckle partly because he had helped redesign a Bay Area bridge to withstand shaking in a major quake. The state engineers submitted six names to the governor through Robert K. Best, the director of transportation. Deukmejian did not say if his next appointee would come from the same list.

The governor apparently trusted the agency’s recommendation of Buckle even while complaining publicly that transportation officials had never warned him that highway structures could fail in an earthquake. But Caltrans engineers revealed Monday that they had given such a warning to their superiors, but the report was never forwarded to the governor.

William E. Schaefer, chief engineer for Caltrans, said state engineers prepared an Oct. 22, 1987, memorandum for Deukmejian indicating that they were worried about a major freeway failure if a catastrophic earthquake hit the California coast. The memo was sent up the chain of command to John Geoghegan, secretary of business, transportation and housing, but never reached the governor.

Geoghegan acknowledged Monday that he received the memo but saw no reason to send it to Deukmejian since its main purpose was to request funds so the department could “accelerate” the second phase of a program to retrofit older bridges to make them more earthquake safe. He said he himself approved the request for funds, making it unnecessary to pass the memo on to the governor.

“I think what we were looking at there is the budget process,” Geoghegan said. “The money was asked for. It was approved and went into the budget and the kind of thing that happened on the Nimitz is just not something that had been contemplated.”

Although Caltrans engineers have conceded they never expected the Nimitz to collapse, they did issue warnings in several internal memos that other freeway bridges--particularly in the Los Angeles area--could collapse, costing numerous lives.

“We cannot afford to risk the loss of key structures on major freeways in a metropolitan area due to an earthquake,” said the October, 1987, departmental memo. “It is prudent for the department to accelerate the Phase 2 retrofit program to prevent collapse of major structures during an earthquake.”

Actual construction on the Phase 2 program referred to in the memo still is not expected to begin until January. The program would provide steel jackets to strengthen freeways supported by single columns and constructed prior to 1971. The collapse of the Nimitz has been blamed on the failure of the sets of double columns supporting the roadway, but it is not yet clear exactly what caused the columns to give way.

Meanwhile, Caltrans officials said the last earthquake study of the Nimitz Freeway was conducted in 1977 and a copy was kept on file for only four years. “We can’t afford to keep every set of calculations,” said James E. Roberts, chief of the department’s structures divisions.

Roberts said the analysis indicated the highway would withstand an earthquake of a magnitude such as the 6.9 quake that rocked the San Francisco Bay Area last week.

“We were on record that we did not think this kind of a structure would collapse, but it did,” Schaefer said.