Todd,

The epicenter of the 1906 earthquake has some scientists in disagreement, but not by that much. The epicenter either occurred near Daly City or the Golden Gate Bridge. The rupture went as far north as Fort Ross and then back out to sea. As for the southern rupture I'm a little fuzzier, but Atherton seems about where it stopped. But there are no reports of it occurring a little north of Parkfield as far as I am aware.

2006 I'm sure will bring everyone a lot closer to the truth on many issues; but I can tell you that Santa Rosa, where I live, had the most severe damage and it nearly leveled the city. There are two distinct reasons for this; the city sits on allevial soils which washed down from the hills and the desire for buildings and residences to be delivered rapidly, caused builders to bypass important safety measures. The Santa Rosa Rural Cemetery is a good place to see the results which houses 300 prior residents who died during the earthquake.

Trenching in Marin reveals that the northern segment of the SAF broke I believe 6 times at intervals of 100 years and 250 years and as we know, not once did the entire length of the fault break. That's pretty good evidence it's unlikely to go all at once.

I have currently but one thing on my 2006 schedule and that is to attend the bell ringing ceremony which occurs every year in downtown SF on April 18 at 5:12am. I think this will probably be the last time that happens and I would like to take a moment to remember with some others, this time around. It would be kind of fun too to stay at the hotel where Enrico Caruso spent the night just before the earthquake to get a little feel of history as well.

Petra