Review: ‘The Really Big One’ by Kathryn Schulz

Regular readers of The New Yorker would not have been surprised that Kathryn Schulz won a Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing for her 2015 article “The Really Big One” (The New Yorker, 2018). Schulz takes the reader by the hand and leads them calmly to the inescapable conclusion that the Pacific Northwest of America is a tragedy waiting to unfold, not just because of nature’s physics, but due to apparent inaction by those responsible for public safety. Schulz has taken what could be considered complex scientific information and presented it in compelling language that can be easily understood.

There is a distinctly human element in the telling. Gathering information from sources such as Dr Chris Goldfinger from Oregon State University, representatives from Oregon Department of Geology and Minerals Industries (DOGAMI), the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Oregon Seismic Safety Policy Advisory Commission (OSSPAC), as well as the schools superintendent and the city planner for Seaside in Oregon, Schulz presents a story that is more than scientific.

Using the “fact, quote and anecdote model” Schulz crafts a piece of creative-fiction, drawing images with words as she describes what will likely happen when the Cascadia earthquake eventuates. It is not alarmist, it is not gruesome. It is a matter-of-fact recounting of what has occurred during other seismic events and will likely occur in Cascadia. In this it serves its purpose of informing readers of the potential outcomes of a devastating earthquake and an unimaginable tsunami.

In the retelling of an anecdote from Dr Goldfinger, Schulz captures very human responses, the wonder and excitement of the paleoseismologist experiencing the 2011 earthquake in Japan and how that experience is extrapolated into concern for the inevitable earthquake and tsunami in Cascadia.

Schulz is politely scathing of the authorities who seem unable to find the will to ensure that policy and code is properly enforced or to engage in the sort of long-term planning required to ensure the best outcomes possible, despite having the information available to justify changes to planning policy, building codes, and emergency management.

We can only hope that her writing is taken to heart.