While The Times sensibly encourages earthquake preparedness [“Support efforts to adequately prepare for next big earthquake,” Opinion, July 21], those recommendations hardly match the calamity we’re told to expect.
Kathryn Schulz’s “The Really Big One” in The New Yorker is noteworthy because her warning is itself an “adequate” response — noticeable among the many polite warnings we have managed to ignore.
Loss-of-life scenarios get the headlines, but predictions of interrupted transportation, water, sewer and power infrastructure are the more deserving topic. And, although extra minutes of warning before the “massive shaker” would save lives, it’s the post-apocalypse survival mode that most of us will face.