How to make an earthquake: The 'All Science. No Fiction.' Liquefaction Fix behind the scenes | OPB
Oregon Public Broadcasting
0:00 All right.
0:00 Count it off and let’s do this!
0:02 [Drums bang] [Drumming] I'm Jes Burns.
0:11 I am a science reporter and producer.
0:14 I produce science videos, namely ‘All Science-’ ‘All Science.
0:20 No Fiction.’ [Drumming] [Dan Evans] Got it [Music] This episode of ‘All Science.
0:37 No Fiction.’ is about a group of scientists at Portland State
0:41 University who are trying to prevent
0:44 soil liquefaction from happening during earthquake.
0:47 [Jes Burns] This is like the waste product of all the bacteria?
0:51 [Arash Khosravifar] -Yeah.
0:52 But it’s not toxic or anything like that?
0:54 -No.
0:54 No.
0:54 Ok.
0:55 I hope not.
0:56 Because I just touched it..
0:56 -You don’t want to [Chatter] -You don’t want to grab
0:59 a spoon and eat it [laughing] Well I won’t do that.
1:02 -Right But I did just stick my finger in it.
1:03 So I found this story through my Executive Producer, Aaron Scott.
1:08 And, the more I read about it,
1:09 the more I knew it was going to be a perfect story for ‘All Science.
1:13 No Fiction.’ It was solutions oriented.
1:15 It had to do with, like,
1:17 the existential threats, facing us- you know, Cascadia Earthquake.
1:21 I knew I wanted to create a scale model of what happens during liquefaction.
1:27 The original idea is that I pictured this kind of Druid scene.
1:31 You know, doo doo doo doo kind of thing.
1:34 And it was going to be people that work
1:36 at OPB- I often cast people around me in my shows.
1:40 I started talking this over with, Dan Evans.
1:43 And he was like, “Uh yeah It’s okay.” And I said,
1:46 “Or we could get a high school drumline in, and we
1:49 could have them be Cascadia.” And he was like,
1:51 “And that's it!” [murmurs and chatter] -I’m going to just go,
1:57 “One-two-ready-go" and then you step.
1:58 [Jes Burns] From there we went, with this idea,
2:01 what Cascadia is doing is like, this thing is far off.
2:05 That’s coming at you, coming at you.
2:06 And then when it hits, it's going to be this chaos.
2:08 [Nalin Silva] We’re starting with chaos?
2:10 We’re starting with chaos.
2:11 Yep.
2:11 -Chaos [Murmurs] [Nalin Silva] A little more chaos please.
2:14 Three, two, one.
2:16 Action.
2:16 [Loud drumming] And we set up this, studio where we filled this dog pool.
2:26 [Dan Evans] Oh my gosh, the dust.
2:29 [Jes Burns] It’s supposed to be low dust We filled it with sand.
2:31 I think that there was approximately six to 800 pounds of sand in there.
2:38 And then we filled that with water [Sand smoothing sounds] So
2:44 I made a little city and I made a little bridge.
2:47 And we buried a pipeline.
2:49 It's an incredible science experiment to do because it's
2:52 so it's so satisfying because it works really well.
2:55 And we didn't know if it was going to work
2:57 because this tank was so big [whisper] This is amazing!
2:59 [Drumming] And exactly what we thought was going to happen, happened.
3:04 The buildings just tilted, tilted, tilted, tilted and fell.
3:08 [Sounds of buildings falling] Alright we’re going to cut it.
3:13 [laughing] When the opportunity came to bring in a local percussion group,
3:18 especially like a high school, I just thought, this is what it means to be OPB.
3:23 We are a group of journalists
3:26 and producers who have connections to our community.
3:29 And those connections are what we're built on.
3:33 What we make wouldn't have nearly any impact- if we got to make anything at all.
3:38 [Nalin Silva] Keep the tempo in your heart
3:40 [metronome clicks] One, two, three, four.
3:43 Two, two, three four.
3:45 [Drums to beat] We are allowed to do what we
3:47 do because of the community support we have and member support.
3:52 [music] [Jes Burns] You would pluck.
3:57 I would come in.
3:59 And you would pluck again And I would say,
4:03 “Something is coming!” [Bang bang bang bang of drums] [Jes Burns]
4:07 But saturated soils can’t compress because there’s water in the way.
4:12 And go!
4:13 [drumming] [Narrator] Buildings sink or tilt Bridges destabilize.
4:20 The longer and stronger an earthquake
4:22 is the more likely liquefaction will happen[...]