These are the kinds of sites you see. Now, all around these places of tremendous damage, there are homes, buildings, installations, freeways that weren't damaged.
That's the way it goes in an earthquake. For an overview and summary of what's been happening here in the wake of the quake, CBS News correspondent, Sandra Hughes, has a report.
Overnight, the sky was lit by a fireball touched off by one of the hundreds of aftershocks.
National Guard troops watched over a quiet curfew. There had been 73 arrests since the quake, much fewer than expected. But dawn didn't banish all the fear.
It's too scary at our house. Every time there's anything moves, like a car drives by, even everybody runs through the doorways or things.
Many awoke in unfamiliar places. Thousands in shelters, others camped out, afraid of being trapped inside.
They were talking about looters on the streets, so we were prepared. We were ready for them.
Few were ready for the commute. It took hours longer for some, with traffic diverted around damaged freeways. But since many stayed home today, it will only get worse.
At the Emergency Operations Center downtown, officials are coping with a crisis. 34 people have died, half a million people are without power, and up to 100,000 without water.
Local officials are fleeting with Washington.
Immediately, the city of Los Angeles needs more people working on this emergency.
In the San Fernando Valley, almost everywhere there are lines for water, gasoline, and groceries.
A lot of the freeways are down, so we don't know which direction the food is coming from, especially out here to the valley.
And there is cleanup.
I don't know if the building is safe. It was mother-in-law's good set of dishes.
They're cleaning up in Santa Monica, too, 20 miles from the epicenter and next door in the Pacific Palisade, where Ron and Regina Orr search through the mud.
This is what we got. This is what we care about. Our kids are safe.
And as if the traffic isn't bad enough, police say tonight sightseers are jamming some of the roads in the San Fernando Valley area.
It is causing gridlock, and it's blocking access for emergency vehicles. Dan?
Sandra, what about the curfew that's in effect the second night?
Well, late this afternoon, officials did extend that dust-to-dawn curfew, so really those sightseers would be in violation of the curfew.
Thanks, Sandra.
Back behind me here, this is what's left of the Santa Monica freeway at Fairfax Avenue.
They've started to clear out the debris, try to rebuild what was one of the busiest freeways in the world.
They're working on the arc lights. Part of this is the federal government out of Washington wanted to put some money in quickly,
so symbolically people would see that work to repair what has happened would be starting immediately.
This gives you some idea of how long it may take, how much of a traffic nightmare this is going to be,
and what positively and negatively the effect is going to be for a long while on this whole area's economy.
Now, the earthquake has taken its deadliest toll at a department building in the San Fernando Valley.
Residents were crushed when the building collapsed on them as they were sleeping.
CBS News correspondent Vicki Mabry was on the scene today when rescue teams officially ended the search for victims.
The 16th and presumably last body was carried from the wreckage of the Northridge Apartments early this afternoon.
In our opinion, we have checked every void, space, and place that we think could possibly be a victim.
Rescue teams with specially trained dogs spent more than 24 hours searching for victims dead or alive.
The search is officially over.
The earthquake was so strong it collapsed second and third stories down onto the first floor where most of the victims were found.
That's why you're seeing this high death toll. These people only had five seconds to realize what was going on
and run out of that building, and that was it.
The Northridge complex was built before the city strengthened its building code.
The whole building is going to be demolished eventually, I would suspect.
The question is whether residents will be able to salvage any belongings.
If this place is knocked down and we don't have a chance to go into it, you're looking at a treasure heap.
But as they watch the bodies of their former neighbors taken away, the survivors realize how lucky they are.
And I don't know if it's really set in. I want to cry, but I haven't yet. Maybe soon. And then start rebuilding.
The Northridge complex would have to be demolished before it could be rebuilt.
Here at the Quakes epicenter, it accounts for almost half of the total deaths caused by the earthquake.
Vicki Maybree, CBS News, Los Angeles.
President Clinton has announced that he is coming here to Southern California tomorrow to survey the earthquake damage.
Just looking at it, you know it will all add up to billions of dollars.
An official of the Federal Emergency Management Agency says its disaster fund is running dry, millions short of the amount needed.
So the agency will soon be asking Congress and taxpayers for more money.
As a taxpayer, you may be asking why there is so much damage here.
Why structures in this part of the country are not all built to withstand an earthquake?
Well, that's one of the questions I put today to a highly respected structural engineer, John Karyotas.
This really shows you in 30 seconds it bends, this collapses as a whole.
Well, it probably opens up in one or two seconds actually.
Well, I tell you, when you're up here up close, you get a real sense of how powerful those one or two seconds were.
See that little ledge that sticks out? This steel plate right there sat on that.
Now back in the days when this was built, we didn't anticipate or nobody anticipated you're going to have as much movement as the ground motion was causing.
Now Highway 14 collapsed right down on top of Interstate 5, which is the major north-south transportation corridor.
Same thing happen there?
No, that was a different situation. The problem there is actually a different kind of thing.
If you notice that one case where the column was standing up, the column didn't fail, the bridge deck did.
The bridge deck did.
The bridge deck did. The bridge deck shared off the pole.
Is it a matter of design or is it a matter of the construction?
Oh, I don't think you would find any so-called construction error in that.
This is probably built in exactly the same way it was detailed on the drawing.
So you have to say, what is it? Well, in a sense, it's a design error.
Drive around. It's Hartford, of course. But you have an apartment collapse onto a parking lot.
You have a mall cave in. You have all kinds of things just buckle and give it up.
Is this the price to be paid for living in Southern California?
No. Look around at the rest of it. Look around at what didn't happen.
You see one building down the street that collapsed.
The rest of the street is lined with buildings that have very little damage.
So are we doing a good job? You're done right we are, because all those buildings that essentially didn't collapse was a matter of success.
And many of them have no damage whatsoever.
Governments, federal, state and local will pay to rebuild the infrastructure damaged or destroyed by the earthquake.
Homeowners, on the other hand, are on their own unless they have earthquake insurance.
And as correspondent Bill Whitaker reports, unfortunately, most do not.
As L.A. digs out, the magnitude of the tragedy is sinking in.
Everything's gone.
Thousands of individual tragedies adding up to one of California's worst catastrophes, already being compared to the big 89 quake in San Francisco, which caused $7 billion in damage.
We've had the fire, the flood, and now the earthquake. I guess next is the locusts.
Insurance companies are gearing up to handle the flood of claims. 200 calls to this farmer's insurance office every hour.
Oh, you were looted also?
Insurance adjusters fanned out today to assess the damage and pay claims. The Sierra's house is unlivable.
Yeah, a few things got tossed around up here, I would say.
But here in Los Angeles, where waiting for the big one is a citywide pastime, less than 40 percent of property owners have earthquake insurance.
Many claim they can't afford the premiums, about 50 percent more than standard homeowners.
And now thousands who lost everything realize they can't afford to replace it all.
You don't have earthquake insurance. It's too expensive to begin with.
Even those with insurance are in for an aftershock. With the standard deduction of 10 percent, many hard-hit homeowners still will end up paying thousands of dollars out of pocket to get back on their feet.
Bill Whitaker, CBS News, Los Angeles.
And still ahead, more from Dan on the California quake. Coming up next, a political shockwave from Washington.
The Clinton-choice for defense secretary suddenly bows out.
And the independent prosecutors report on Iran-Contra, what it says about Presidents Reagan and Bush.
Going back to work or school today, for some people that was nigh impossible.
But it never seems reali—