Morgan City's Seismic Design Category, explained

Under the seismic model IBC and ASCE 7 use for new construction, Morgan City is Category B. Low seismic hazard. Code requires basic seismic detailing (bracing, connections) but no special structural system restrictions. Nationally, Morgan City ranks above 23% of the 4,875 cities in this dataset for seismic hazard - the 23th percentile.

Morgan City by the numbers

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.042g, short-period spectral response 0.086g, 1-second spectral response 0.05g. Among 59 Louisiana cities in this dataset, Morgan City ranks 36 for seismic hazard, the 40th percentile within the state. About 10,813 people live in Morgan City, Louisiana.

What a retrofit costs in Morgan City

Outside California, no state-level retrofit grant equivalent to Brace + Bolt could be found for Louisiana. A typical retrofit still runs $5,000-$10,000 nationally, about $7,000 for a common single-family job.

Earthquake insurance for a Morgan City home

Outside California, earthquake coverage is typically sold as an endorsement added to a standard homeowners policy, not a separate product - worth asking about directly when getting a home-insurance quote for a Morgan City address.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide covers exactly how USGS's public design-maps API produced Morgan City's numbers. The guide to what a Seismic Design Category actually means covers why a category is never a substitute for an engineer's assessment of one specific house.