Tremors Cause Little Damage to Local Area : Quakes: Two municipal buildings sustained interior damage. About one quarter of the area experienced temporary power outages Sunday.

AREAWIDE —  Sunday’s double whammy--the strongest earthquake to hit Southern California in 40 years and the major jolt that followed--left the Glendale area relatively unscathed.

A third earthquake Monday--a 3.9 magnitude temblor centered near La Canada Flintridge--also was of little consequence in the foothills area.

Only one structure--the six-story Community Bank building in downtown Glendale--was temporarily cordoned off after Sunday’s quakes until inspectors declared it safe on Monday.

Significant interior damage was reported at two Glendale municipal buildings: the vintage art-deco Public Service Building and the Municipal Services Building in the City Hall Plaza.

About a quarter of Glendale’s population experienced power outages as a result of the strong Landers and Big Bear quakes, but most service was restored within an hour, said Tommy Wu, power management administrator.

Emergency Services Coordinator Gerald Shamburg said he arrived at Glendale’s emergency operations center in the City Hall basement within minutes after the shaking ended from the pre-dawn 7.4-magnitude Landers quake. “We were very surprised that we had no major damage reported,” Shamburg said.

Under the city’s earthquake response procedures, firefighters and police patrol officers immediately fanned out across the city to check for damage. A few power lines were downed and some gas leaks were reported--but the operations center was never fully activated, Shamburg said.

But John Hickman, facilities services administrator, said workers were “most concerned” about interior damage on the fifth and sixth floors of the Public Service Building at 119 N. Glendale Ave. He said desks and file cabinets had been overturned and moved as much as 12 feet as a result of the north-south sway of the building.

If the earthquake had occurred during working hours, “there would have been some serious injuries,” Hickman said. “A lot of stuff came down in areas where people normally would have been sitting.”

Construction is near completion on a new public service building next to the old one, which may be torn down later this year. Historical and architectural organizations are fighting to preserve the 63-year-old Art Deco/Moderne building.

Hickman said the Sunday temblors shook loose dangerous amounts of asbestos on the second floor of the Municipal Services Building at 633 E. Broadway, where the cancer-causing insulation is being removed from ceiling grid tiles.

A specialist in the removal of contaminants worked throughout the night and into the early morning Monday to clean up asbestos debris before city employees arrived for work.

Both the Landers quake and the 6.5-magnitude Big Bear quake on Sunday were stronger than the 5.8-magnitude Sierra Madre earthquake of a year before, but many in the area said the damage was less, largely because of the greater distance from the epicenter.

An employee at the Cost Plus store in downtown Glendale said most of the damage consisted of broken wine bottles, whereas china and glass products throughout the store were broken in the Sierra Madre quake.

Dean Kimmerle, building inspection supervisor, said Glendale officials got only half a dozen requests for property inspections. He said damage reports should be compiled by Friday.

La Canada Flintridge City Manager Gabrielle Pryor said the city had no reports of damage or injuries from the various quakes, despite the close proximity of Monday’s tremor. “It was real sharp, but it didn’t last long,” she said.

But the city has scheduled two seminars on earthquake preparedness because “people are nervous about the Big One,” Pryor said. The seminars will be from 7 to 9 p.m. Tuesday and from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. July 11 at Descanso Gardens, 1418 Descanso Drive.