The rainy season is over, what's the state of California's water supply? How to prep your water reserve in case of disaster, California Geological Survey's new app.
Californians are back to using about as much water as before the drought
California's rainy season was pretty dry. Here's what that means for you
Drought, earthquake, zombie apocalypse — water supply is key
If California's much anticipated "big one" were to hit today, would you be ready?
When we've talked about this before, one of the things our experts emphasized was the importance of storing water. Southern California takes the majority of its water from faraway resources, so in the event of a major disaster, the area would likely be cut off from its water source.
Because April is earthquake preparedness month, we thought we'd turn to an expert on what to do in an emergency -- someone's who's all about preparing for the worst-case scenario.
Christopher Nyerges has been teaching survival preparedness in L.A. for over 40 years. Whether it's the big one, or if you just want to get ready in case there's another drought, Nyerges has a few tips on how to improve and store up your own water supply.
Storing water 101
- Nyerges uses barrels, the kind used for pickles and other foods, but that's not the only way to store water.
- The cheapest way to get water storage containers is to get discards from the food service industry, though this takes a little time and effort.
- Easiest and most convenient way would be to reuse small, run-of-the-mill plastic water containers.
Pro-tip: Christopher recommends using the plastic containers that house carbonated water. "I specifically save those because those will last up to five or six years before springing a leak," he says.
Debunking an old myth: "People used to suggest adding chlorine to your water if you're going to store water if you're worried about an earthquake," said Nyerges, "You already have it in your tap water." The only reason you'd add chlorine because it might develop algae in a few years time. It's not toxic, it's just a natural occurrence.
Take control as an individual
- Gray water— According to Nyerges, recycling is not that difficult to do. "If you have an orchard, garden or small yard you can take kitchen, sink and tub water and put it in the yard pretty safely. You just have to move perhaps move a hose around."
- Rainwater—"You don't really need a rain barrel per se, but you need something clean," advised Nyerges, "You need a food grade plastic and you put it out under your gutters where the rain drains off of your roof."
Litmus test—Nyerges also recommends testing the acidity of rain collected, especially if you plan to use it for drinking. However, if it's strictly for the yard it doesn't matter.
Pro-tip: When it comes to collecting rainwater, Nyergest has often encouraged people to paint their roofs white. "There's a liquid rubber product that building supply places sell. It's for RV's, typically to make it cooler..."
When using this product, the rainwater slides off the rubber roof and doesn't collect the grime and dirt one may get on regular types of roofs.
Some other simple tips:
- Don't have plants that require a lot of water. Grow drought-tolerant plants or native plants that produce food.
- Shower aerators are an easily installed option that can cut down your water use by up to 50 percent!
- Don't wash your car. Nyerges says, it's just a waste.
- Make a note of your usage— carry around a notebook with you and jot down how much water you're using on an average day. See where there's room for cuts.
Want to know if you're living in an earthquake danger zone? There's an app for that
Where you are right now, that could be one of the spots that'd be leveled in an earthquake.
Your house, your work, your local school — if you're curious at all about the danger level of any of those places, well, there's an app for that.
It comes from the California Geological Survey (CGS), and it shows you a map of all of the quake hotspots.
Just search for an address, click on the corresponding plot of land and see three different types of quake hazard:
- A fault zone, which CGS defines as a place where the earth's surface breaks along a fault
- A liquefaction zone, which is an area where a quake causes soil to temporarily turn to quicksand so it cannot support structures
- A landslide zone, which is a place where a quake could cause a landslide
Tim McCrick, who heads the Earthquake Hazards Program with CGS, said the app was created because the maps CGS had were hard for people to access and understand.
So what was happening was people who were going through a real estate transaction and showing up at the table to sign all the papers and then were confronted with a natural hazards disclosure form, and that was the first inking that they might be affected by one of these ground failure hazards that we map.
If this information seems alarming, don't get too worried, McCrink said; this tool isn't meant to scare people, just let them be proactive about potential problems with earthquakes in their area.
We know that within any one of these zones, it's only a small proportion that will actually suffer from that ground failure hazard. Finding out after the disaster happens is probably the worst time to find out that you’re subject to one of these ground failure hazards. So the idea is to get the information out that there might be a problem so that the hazard can be investigated.
But it's never a bad idea to be prepared, so here are McCrink's tips to be ready for a quake:
- Have supplies stored in case you have to shelter in place and remember utilities might be shut down
- Have a plan for who you will get in touch with outside of your area to let loved ones know if you are safe or in need of help
- Earthquake insurance is a good option to consider
And if you feel the ground start to shake, McCrink says the old 'Drop, Cover and Hold On' is still the standard safety procedure.
Residents of another large OC homeless encampment await eviction
Can ABC rein in its newest rising star?
Last week, the "Roseanne" revival debuted on ABC to a whopping 8.1 million viewers. After three days of additional viewing, that number went up to 21.9 million.
To no one's surprise, the sitcom starring Roseanne Barr, John Goodman, Laurie Metcalf, Sara Gilbert, Alicia Goranson and Michael Fishman has already been renewed for a second season.
But amid Roseanne's success, ABC has some tricky talent on its hands — Roseanne Barr, a Trump supporter in both the show and in real life, is tweeting conspiracy theories.
"She was tweeting about President Trump breaking up child sex trafficking rings," said Vanity Fair's Rebecca Keegan, "a conspiracy theory known as 'The Storm,' that has been sort of shared on the website 4chan... It's not a real thing and it's kind of troubling when the star of a hit TV show is tweeting out ideas like this."
But is there anything the network, ABC can do about it?
This isn't the first time Roseanne has done this. She's also tweeted inflammatory views about Muslims. Horrific personal attacks against Huma Abedin, Hilary Clinton's aide.
The question is, to what extent does a mainstream broadcast TV network get involved in these issues of partisan politics? Both in terms of what it shows over its airwaves and in terms of what its talent is saying out there in the universe.
Also:
- Steven Spielberg got audiences to the theater this weekend with a nostalgia play
- How two other old shows are coming back to T.V., "Cagney & Lacey" and "Murphy Brown," how will they be adapted for the #MeToo era?
On The Lot, Take Two's weekly segment about the business of entertainment and Hollywood, airs every Monday.
California farmers could be slammed by new China tariffs
President Trump's imposition of new tariffs on steel and aluminum did not go over well with China.
If you've wondered what trade retaliation from China might look like, here it is.
Starting today, Beijing is raising tariff rates as high as 25 percent on more than 100 U.S. exports--and some of those, like almonds, pistachios and cherries, could hit California growers particularly hard.
This could be the beginning of a back-and-forth trade war between the U.S. and China. So how are farmers dealing with the news, and preparing for possible escalation of international trade battles?
Jamie Johansson is president of the California Farm Bureau Federation. He weighed in about the agricultural industry’s reaction, and whether China could be doing more harm to themselves with higher tariffs.
California exports affected by tariffs
China is our third largest destination for California products. Leading the way is our nut crops. Pistachios, almonds, then wine and oranges...so we're watching this closely.
Reaction from farmers
We're not surprised. Farming has always been at the forefront of any trade war. It's one of the few sectors in the U.S. that actually runs a trade surplus with China. So we knew and prepared for that... We have a strong contingent of agriculture-focused Congress people who we're talking with.
If tariffs last a long time
We export to about 90 million countries throughout the globe, so we would certainly find other markets... Other countries would certainly become more interested [in our products]. We may have to have lower prices, and that could hurt our farmers, but we would continue to work as we always have to compete in the global economy.
Your chance to visit Teotihuacan, the first great city in the Americas, at LACMA
The first great city in America stands on the raggedy outskirts of Mexico City. Teotihuacan is half the size of Manhattan, and millions visit the archaeological site every year. Now, Angelenos can get a taste of what it must have been like to live there, courtesy of a new exhibit at LACMA.
Teotihuacan — pronounced tay-oh-TEE-wuh-kahn — is one of the most enigmatic of ancient cultures. We don’t know what language was spoken there, nor what its people called themselves, nor what they called their town. It was the awe-struck Aztecs, who arrived in roughly 1200 AD — some 500 years after the city was abandoned — who dubbed it Teotihuacan — meaning “Birthplace of the Gods.” The Aztecs assumed superhumans created its three mighty pyramids and its great central boulevard and its grid of streets, its walls painted with vividly colored birds and feathered serpents, goggle-eyed cats and squat, angular deities … beings so overwhelming that the Aztecs invited them into their own pantheon, as Quetzalcoatl, their plumed snake, and Tlaloc, their rain god.
At the press preview for “City and Cosmos: The Arts of Teotihuacan,” LACMA curator Megan O’Neil joked that Tlaloc must have come along with all the crates of artifacts. "Has anybody noticed it’s been raining more often the past three weeks in Los Angeles? Well, about three and a half weeks ago is when the truck arrived delivering the storm god to Los Angeles. And since then, it’s been raining almost every day, and the storm god graced us with a beautiful rainstorm today. I think most people said, 'Oh, I’m so sorry it’s raining today,' and I said, 'That’s wonderful, 'cuz the storm god is here.'"
The exhibit spans the city’s 700-year inhabited history and was assembled in collaboration with Mexico’s Institute of Anthropology and History. It includes some 200 artifacts, and as O'Neil says:
"They’re the fruit of much labor and meticulous work and investigation by many different archeologists over the past century. The first two pieces that you see in the exhibition came out of ground just about 5 years ago. Please take a moment and look into their faces. See their eyes are open, their mouths are open. They’re speaking to us across the centuries; their artists are speaking to us across the centuries."
O’Neil says recent diggings have uncovered objects that help us understand the city’s chronology and complex societal questions, and what the people were like. "Take a look," she says, "and try to find the speech scrolls that are filled with flowers. When you spoke to your deities and your ancestors, you didn’t speak with angry speech — you speak with beautiful, aromatic speech."
For half a millennium, this polyglot, many-cultured city was the center of civilization in the Americas. It traded with other civilizations, like the Maya and the Oaxacans. At LACMA you can see trade goods from the far corners of Mexico and Central America, whose people resided in their own Barrios in Teotihuacan.
The artifacts include many masks. There are also intricately filigreed incense burners and flat-topped stone deities; red-cast Teotihuacanos dancing in the attire of their gods. And murals of feathered snakes gushing water. In fact, the Teotihuacanos almost worshiped water: in a recently discovered tunnel under the Pyramid of the Serpent, archeologists found a watery paradise lined with iridescent minerals and filled with precious objects.
![Standing Figure, Tlalocan [tunnel under Feathered Serpent Pyramid], Teotihuacan, Mexico, 200–250](https://scpr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/38ef0a1/2147483647/strip/true/crop/390x587+0+0/resize/780x1174!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fa.scpr.org%2F200816_4af793e4a912ee9e651939d8a7d9a188_original.jpg)
Its people are gone, but the city and its legacy live on, says O'Neil: "Teotihuacan as a city fell into ruin, but it was never lost from memory. The Maya people a thousand miles away, kept making reference to the grand city of Teotihuacan. The people of Tula and Aztec kept making reference to this place of art and writing, of glorious civilization, and we continue that today."
O’Neil says that there are signs of terminal civil strife sometime before 600 AD. But there may be as many explanations for the great city’s demise as there are Teotihuacan archeologists. That’s because, as pioneer scholar Esther Pasztory put it, “Much of their art is minimal and tells no stories.’’
But at LACMA, that art unfolds glories of a great, lost civilization.
“City and Cosmos: The Arts of Teotihuacan” is at LACMA’s Resnick Pavilion until mid-July.