The Earthquake That Almost Ended San Francisco — 1989

On October 17th, 1989, a magnitude 6.9 earthquake struck the San Francisco Bay Area just as Game 3 of the World Series was about to begin. But it wasn't the strength of the shaking that decided who lived. It was the ground underneath – soft bay mud under a double-deck freeway in Oakland, sand pumped off the bay floor under San Francisco's Marina District, and water pipes that tore apart just as the fires started. What followed killed sixty-three people and came within one breeze of burning San Francisco down again. 0:00 Fifteen Seconds 1:31 A City Built on Fill 2:58 Game Three 3:41 The Rock Gives Way 5:11 The Cypress Viaduct 6:42 The Bay Bridge 7:26 The Marina Turns to Liquid 8:16 Fire at Beach and Divisadero 9:41 The First Rescuers 10:51 Sherra Cox 12:43 Sixty-Three 13:48 What California Changed For copyright and business inquiries, contact us at: [email protected] Music by Epidemic Sound.