ALTADENA, Calif. — Serving as the cornerstone of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Southern California wildfire response is respect for the people, structures and history of the area. In the Eaton Fire zone of Altadena, California, stands Eliot Arts Magnet Academy — a school in the development and promotion of the arts, nurturing the creative talents of many local students.
“Eliot Arts is an innovative magnet school. We nurture middle school students' academic achievement through music, dance, theater arts and visual arts. We also have a conservatory after school offering over 20 arts courses taught by teaching artists,” according to its website.
Unfortunately, during the fire, the school’s auditorium was destroyed. Maria de la Torre, a subject matter expert with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers debris removal team said, “The auditorium was just renovated in 2013, and was one of the best in the district—the place to host events.” While the auditorium will need to be rebuilt, efforts are now underway to retain the tower that was built alongside the auditorium as a memorial for the city.
“As I mentioned, most of the damage is in the auditorium,” de la Torre said. “Most of the community wants to save the tower.” To make that happen, crews from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are supporting the community in assessing the damage and preserving what they can as recovery plans develop. “They are doing modeling to assess what is possible,” she said. “We don’t know the full plan yet, so for now we are assessing structural integrity.”
Working to perform those assessments quickly are engineers like Ian Buchanan. Assigned as a civil engineer specializing in structural engineering, Buchanan, a Sacramento District employee, is focused on ensuring safety from the start. “The first stage of the project is to see what part of the structure can be removed and what needs to remain in order to keep the building structurally stable,” he said.
There are specific areas of the tower that raise concern due to the intense heat of the fire. “We’re worried about the walls on the south side of the fire,” Buchanan said. “But with paper still hanging on the wall, it seems the reinforced concrete worked. We’re also very concerned about the wall on the east side of the auditorium and are examining it very closely.”
Undertaking the mission to inspect buildings damaged by wildfire brings a sense of pride to the engineers on site. “It’s nice to be able to work on something that helps preserve something for the community,” Buchanan said. “If we can preserve something that survived the damage, we want to keep it up.”