Head stonemason recalls quake as repairs start on National Cathedral

A flatbed truck is parked on the grounds of the National Cathedral in
Washington, D.C. On it rest 45 large stones that were removed
individually, piece by piece, from the Gothic structure’s central tower
following last year’s 5.8-magnitude earthquake that shook the nation’s
capital and much of the Northeast.

The earthquake left a scene of devastation in its wake at the cathedral that will take millions of dollars and at least a decade to restore fully. Cherubs, gargoyles, pinnacles and flying buttresses were all damaged, and huge sections of stone cracked and twisted on their axes.

{mosads}The interior of the cathedral suffered minor damage as well. Industrial-strength netting hangs in the nave to catch any masonry that could come loose in the restoration phase, which is now getting under way.

“It’s as though a giant hand reached out and twisted everything,” said head stonemason Joe Alonso, on a recent tour of the cathedral.

He remembers vividly when the quake struck at 1:51 p.m. local time on Aug. 23, 2011. “It was very fortuitous where we were that day,” Alonso said.

“We were on the ground … I was in my truck. We would have been on the top deck of that scaffold on the north side doing regular maintenance work. But we were still finishing up work on the front steps.”

Had Alonso and his colleagues been on the scaffold that day, they could have suffered serious injuries from the avalanche of falling debris that rained down when the quake struck. “It was littered with fist-sized chunks of limestone that had fallen from the tower above,” he recalled.

A second-generation stonemason, Alonso has worked at the cathedral since 1985, when he was brought on board to help finish the project that took 83 years to complete.

“Between 1985 and 1990, we were building about 10 feet a year.”

Now 51, Alonso remembers the devastation that greeted him and fellow stonemason Sean Callahan on the rooftop. There was a stunned silence as they first took in the scene.

“As soon as we stepped out on to the roof, it was just littered with huge chunks of stone. The pinnacles had shaken themselves apart. … Yet so much of it fell the right way. Had the quake lasted two or three more seconds we would have suffered a lot more damage,” Alonso said.

“It was sad to see that damage, knowing what it takes to put a building like this together. It’s still mind-boggling to me to see what these stones did, how they moved and shifted. I’m still amazed when I look at this stuff,” Alonso said.

While the damage is extensive high above the ground, the cathedral is structurally sound.

“The structure of the cathedral absorbed the impact [of the quake], but the energy just kept traveling upward until it popped,” Alonso said.

“One of the big challenges when we reconstruct this is how can we make it more earthquake-resistant. This is built in the traditional way, stone upon stone. There is no steel holding this building together,” said Alonso.

Therein lies the challenge for authorities at the cathedral — it’s not just a case of repairing and replacing damaged masonry. In some cases whole sections of the central tower will have to be dismantled piece by piece before repairs can be made and the structure fully restored.

Raising funds will be key: “We can’t do work for which we don’t have the money to pay,” communications director Richard Weinberg said.

Before the earthquake struck, the cathedral had estimated $30 million of pre-existing preservation needs. Damage resulting from the earthquake is expected to run an additional $20 million. About $2 million has been spent over the past year on stabilizing the structure alone.

On the first anniversary of the quake, Lilly Endowment Inc. made a $5 million donation. With about $8 million on hand, the cathedral can now begin the restoration phase.

“There are a lot of projects … the work needs to be sequenced and prioritized. It would be a poor use of resources not to tackle other projects,” Weinberg said. “But if people give money for earthquake repairs, then it’s going to be used for earthquake repairs.”

A restoration task force of experts in engineering, architecture and construction created last September will present a road map to cathedral authorities on how best to proceed.

“We finally have some money to do some real work. But we’re going to have to contract this out. We need help with this,” said Alonso.

That help can’t come soon enough for Alonso and the two-man crew caring for the cathedral that has become an important part of the national life of the country.

Asked what damage another earthquake might do, Alonso paused for a moment before responding.

“You don’t want to think about that. It did what it did and we’ll deal with that. If there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s this: Gothic cathedrals and earthquakes don’t mix.”