Firm Says New Device Pinpoints Quake Damage

A Ventura earthquake-alarm company says it has developed a seismic device that quickly evaluates structural stress and equipment damage to businesses after a quake.

Earthquake Safety Systems Inc., a 6-year-old privately owned company, says its new $15,000 digital instrument, a Seismic Intensity Recorder Controller, will allow businesses to assess a quake’s impact even before official seismic readings are announced.

ESS said its product is an adaptation of devices used at nuclear power plants to prevent unwarranted shutdowns caused by minor quakes. The company says it has sold the new devices to a Taiwan chemical firm, to a Hewlett-Packard facility in Oregon, Northrop Corp. in Hawthorne and KCAL-TV in Hollywood.

E. Owen Widdicombe, president of ESS, said the device monitors stress and damage at various points in a building. A structural engineer figures out each building’s safety threshold and then a computer program in this device pinpoints where and how much damage has occurred, from water and electrical to hydraulic systems.