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| Coastsiders remember Loma Prieta earthquake By Greg Thomas [ greg@hmbreview.com ] Published/Last Modified on Wednesday, October 14, 2009 1:44 PM PDT Mike Benedetti remembers exactly where he was at 5:04 p.m. on Oct. 17, 1989. He and his father, Norm, were watching the warm-up for the third game of the World Series at Candlestick Park when the stadium began rumbling with more than fanfare. “From where we were sitting – third deck, straight away, center field – you could see the cantilever sections coming together in a wave, and when they did, you could see great big clouds of concrete dust blowing out. You could see the stands and the light towers swaying. It was a surreal experience,” said Benedetti, who co-owns Arcangeli Grocery Co. with his brother in Pescadero. Without a second thought for the game they’d been anticipating all season, the two men got to their feet and calmly but swiftly headed for the parking lot. Spinning through radio stations on their way over Highway 92, the Benedettis got snippets of the first reports of damage incurred around the Bay Area. Their families were at home in Santa Cruz, but the quake had knocked out phone lines to the area. Highways 1 and 17 were also out of commission, creating a virtual impasse between the Benedettis and home. The family store in Pescadero was in shambles, but it was their only refuge. By the time the two men arrived, their employees were already sweeping up the sticky mess that had accumulated on the floor of the store. “Our manager said (wine bottles) were shooting out of the shelves and hitting the wall on the other side of the building,” Benedetti said. “There was thousands of dollars of damages to the store, plus the merchandise.” Outside, on Stage Road, business owners were coping in the aftermath, nailing plywood into the slots left by shattered windows. In spite of the damage, most of the stores kept their doors open to customers, who filed in for flashlights and canned foods. “Pescadero is kind of a unique place,” Benedetti said. “The local people know each other. So when there’s a problem, like when there’s an earthquake or a flood, the town is scared, but people come together to help each other – even people who don’t get along on a regular basis.” The Benedettis holed up with blankets on the floor of the store’s office for two days, until the roads were opened and they could return home. Damages on the Coastside were confined mainly to shattered dishes and toppled chimneys – far more bearable than the hardships of death and destruction that befell people in San Francisco and the East Bay. But the disaster galvanized South Coast residents to form a Neighborhood Emergency Service Team through the La Honda Fire Brigade. “It was the first time we identified the need to have an additional response to such incidents,” said Larry Whitney, chief of the brigade. NEST, as it’s commonly referred, created a platform for neighbors to assist one another in the event of widespread emergency. People were better prepared when the next catastrophe rolled through the South Coast during the notorious El Niño storms in 1998, Whitney said. On the flipside of calamity, at least one Coastside family was better off as a result of the quake. The cracks carved out a new path for Coastsider Doug Adams, a general contractor in Half Moon Bay. In the wake of the collapse, Adams found himself facing a region desperately in need of rebuilding. He seized the opportunity to expand by diving into concrete and foundation repair – a market cornered by only a handful of professionals at the time. “We were busy without hesitation for the next 15 years as a result of that one part of the earthquake,” Adams said. “Think about being busy seven days a week for that time. It’s really different. The phone rings and you wake up, and when the phone stops ringing, then you can retire.” Adams has found a comfortable niche in concrete, spinning Bay Cities Concrete and Masonry Restoration into a lucrative family business. “(The earthquake) changed people’s lives,” he said. “If you’re in my line of business, you knew your life was going to change for a long time.” |