Matt Ortega

Eighteen years ago, the Loma Prieta earthquake rattled the San Francisco Bay Area and killed 62 people.

Collapsed homes in the Marina District are as vivid as they were on local television in 1989. The collapsed section on the Bay Bridge and the destruction of the Cyprus freeway are signature images of that destructive day.

The earthquake postponed Game 3 of the 1989 World Series, dubbed the Bay Bridge Series, between the Bay Area’s two Major League Baseball teams: the Oakland Athletics and the San Francisco Giants. Oakland went on to sweep San Francisco, four games to none.

Through Wikipedia, I learned a few interesting tidbits:

• Out of respect for the earthquake victims, the Oakland Athletics weren’t allowed to celebrate their World Series victory with champagne. [...]
• In the CBS Radio Network booth that was right next to the ABC Sports television booth, announcers Jack Buck, Johnny Bench, and John Rooney bolted as soon as the earthquake started. This was in sharp contrast to ABC’s Al Michaels, Jim Palmer, and Tim McCarver, who all seemed to maintain their composure on camera once a back-up generator restored their power. Bench ran to a spot underneath a steel grate. Buck soon told Bench “If you would have moved that fast when you played, you wouldn’t have hit into so many double plays.”

The late Jack Buck: hilarious even in times of crisis.

In 1989, I was just weeks shy of my fifth birthday but remember that day vividly.

My younger brother, just a year-and-a-half old, slept in his crib, undisturbed through the whole thing. My older brother and I were playing with our “G.I. Joe” action figures with a neighborhood friend on the front porch of our Hayward home and listening to the World Series pre-game show on television in the living room.

My mother was watching us and tending to things in the house while my father was stranded on the peninsula, and luckily for him, because he would have been stranded on the San Mateo Bridge instead. He managed to pull over and find someone with a cell phone to call home and let us know he was safe.