If you’ve lived in BC for even a short while, someone will inform you that the province is overdue for The Big One at any time. Every year, thousands of small earthquakes rattle our land, some even making the cupboards shake. But mostly, we don’t even know they happened.
BC has three major fault zones that either slide past each other, slide under the other, or expand away from each other. Although we don’t feel them most of the time, we’ve had some major seismic activity off shore, and we need to be ready for any that may happen closer to the land or cataclysmically large ones.
Every year, the Great Shake Out helps all communities prepare. We encourage all citizens to Drop, Cover, and Hold On at 11:20am on Thu Oct 20. Shake Out BC has all the information on their website so that you can learn more about earthquake preparedness, review/update your emergency plans, and run your own earthquake drills.
Resources and Information
City of Vancouver earthquake preparedness page
Shake Out website – the parent US site listing all the countries taking part
British Columbia earthquake fact sheet (pdf) 12 pages
Seismic Canada earthquake fact sheet (pdf) 2 pages
CBC article about the 6.4 magnitude 2011 earthquake off northern Vancouver Island
