Quake engineers on the job

When the earth starts rocking, Peter Yanev starts rolling.

Yanev is a seismic engineer and cofounder of the San Francisco-based risk management consulting firm EQE International, which specializes in evaluating damage from earthquakes. And with the recent series of destructive temblors, he's been busy.

Within 24 hours of the 7.4 magnitude earthquake that struck near Istanbul, Turkey, last August, Yanev and a team of investigators were on the scene gathering information and giving on-the-spot engineering advice to those affected most.

Such fact-finding trips also offer valuable opportunities for seismic engineers to gain firsthand knowledge of earthquakes and their impact. As Yanev explains, "We always send some junior engineers for their first time. It's a huge educational experience. There's nothing like the real thing. It's more physicalnot just theory."

Yanev has been putting that theory into practice since he started EQE International in 1980. Today, it's the largest risk consulting company in the nation with nearly 600 employees, most of whom are engineers. Though the recent shaking in southern California's Mojave Desert didn't cause much damage, business continues to grow as more and more domestic companies seek to minimize a quake's impact by taking preemptive measures to shore up their buildings. That translates into a healthy job market for future earthquake engineers, says Yanev.

Is it more than just coincidence, though, that so many devastating quakes have hit recently? No, says Yanev, since earthquakes occur on a regular basis. What is different, however, "is several earthquakes occurring in heavily populated areas in a short amount of time. But that's probability for you."

And more business, no doubt, for the globe-trotting Yanev.

Copyright American Society for Engineering Education Dec 1999
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved