Degenblog

Engineers for a Sustainable World: Padang reconnaissance

After travelling for 36 hours halfway across the world from San Francisco to Padang, Indonesia, I wearily walked past the collapsed wing of the Hotel Inna Muara and into a make shift hotel lobby where I met Greg Deierlein , 4 recent Stanford alumni, and the rest of the EERI reconnaissance team. This was my first exposure to Engineers for a Sustainable World (ESW). All four Stanford alums had participated in ESW’s Seismic Mitigation and Tsunami Evacuation Project in Padang. ...

Padang Earthquake, Brian DiBarnaba, Day 4

Pandang Earthquake 2009 Reconnaissance October 17, 2008 Brian DiBarnaba

After talking to some EERI folks last night, we found another steel building to look at. Located less than a mile away from our hotel, the Hotel Mariani International consisted of two buildings: concrete frame building built in 1963 (see Figure 1), and a steel frame building built in 2008 – the steel building did not fare so well (see Figure 2). (Figure 1)...

Padang Earthquake, Brian DiBarnaba, Day 3

Pandang Earthquake 2009 Reconnaissance October 16, 2008 Brian DiBarnaba

This morning (Friday), we decided to head to the Pariaman Landslide located about 34 miles NNE of the City of Padang. After driving through winding paved and unpaved roads for about 2 hours, we arrived to an unbelievable site. Roughly 10 square miles of earth slide down towards the river. An example of one of the slides is shown in Figure 1. Four villages were partially or completely buried. The buildings that ...

Padang Earthquake, Brian DiBarnaba, Day 2

Padang Earthquake 2009 Reconnaissance by Brian DiBarnaba

Today (Thursday) the entire Degenkolb team got to go out together. We started the day with our driver and Nick taking us through town to give us a general idea of all the damage in the city of Padang. We cruised through Chinatown, Old Town, City Center, and some of the outskirts. Although this was my second day here, it was still amazing to see the extent of the damage while at ...

Padang Earthquake, Brian DiBarnaba, Day 1

Pandang Earthquake 2009 Reconnaissance October 14, 2008 by Brian DiBarnaba After roughly 48 hours of traveling around the world, I arrive in Padang, Indonesia, located slightly to the south of the Equator on island of Sumatera on Tuesday evening. Nick Alexander picked me up from the airport and took me out to an authentic Indonesian dinner prior to me finding my hotel room and promptly crashing on my bed for one of the best night sleeps I’ve had in ...