An Experiment in Alternative Methods of Earthquake Prediction, page 149

Hello everyone,

back in this post on June 7, I posted the following prediction:

This prediction is for an earthquake of magnitude 7.0 (Mw) or greater, within or at least close to the coordinates of 14 S and 76 to 77 W, within a time window of seven days from the time of this post, which is just after 20:15 UTC on June 7, 2012.

A quake in or very close the stated zone will only be counted as a "hit" if it is at least a magnitude 6.5 Mw and is within the specified time window. Anything less than that just is too small in terms of energy release.

I wish to state that no such quake occurred within the stated region and time frame, and so this prediction is a no hit. Furthermore, there has not been even one magnitude 7.0 or greater quake anywhere in the world since April 12, 2012 (a mag 7.0 in the Gulf of California) -- meaning that a full 78 days have now passed since that last event.

While this is well beyond the long-term average of one such event approximately every 23.5 days (world-wide), it does not mean the next one has to occur within the next few days. There have been much longer periods between magnitude 7-plus events in the last century or so, including some cases of 100+ days between such events.

I'm pointing this out to make it clear that the over-average time since the last quake (on April 12) had no bearing on my decision to make the prediction as I did back on June 7. My prediction was based on observations and indications in the target region, and in this case I simply got it wrong.

It was not a case of, "It's been (X) days since the last one and that's over the average, so another one is due any tick of the clock", because for one thing, the average interval between larger quakes is just that: an average. It's primarily useful for statistical purposes. For example, while the rate for 1/1/1900 to 12/31/1999 for mag 7.0 or bigger events was 15.53 per annum (according to the centennial list), the variation of time between events is huge.

However, I am currently exploring a hypothesis that there could be a predictive advantage in determining when a mag 7.0 or greater quake might occur in one special circumstance. My first rough review of longer-term data suggests that when there is a period of more than 2x the average between one M.7.0 (or bigger) quake and the next, then the next such event after that has a greater chance of occurring at less than the average interval.

Example: say there is a mag 7.0 or bigger quake, and then it's more than 47 days till the next one. [Average interval is 23.5 days, so 47 is 2x this number.] It appears that the next large quake after that event occurs less than 23.5 days later -- more often than not -- and this seems to be so even when "aftershock" events are excluded. (As they can often be expected to occur pretty soon after a big shock.)

I'm still studying the data and it's a slow process because the source Centennial Quake Data Catalogue -- available here from USGS and produced by researchers from the U of Colorado -- has the listed quake data in a scanned-in form in the pdf. So, I have to manually assemble my own list of qualifying events (no copy and paste!) and it's very tedious and takes a lot of time.

I expect to have some firm figures from this project available during the coming month as I now have some vacation time to work on it. So, I'll see what an objective review of the data actually shows. If my hypothesis is right, then it could be useful in prediction work. If it's wrong then at least it can be excluded. While I'm only into the 2nd decade of the 20th century with the data so far, the figures look encouraging. But that's only a small percentage of the data I'm working with and so I'm not counting my chickens!

Mike

reply to post by JustMike

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That's hilarious! Also its good to know that you are medically cleared which means you will be around for a while, which means, hopefully, you will continue to keep us updated as you do, which is much appreciated!

reply to post by wasobservingquietly

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Wow, funny you mention it. Yes, my cat has not been sleeping on the bed the past couple nights (this is highly unusual) and instead has been sleeping back in the closet. My wife and I were concerned this morning because he did not even come out for treats before we left for work - again exceptionally unusual. He is usually all over the place - mr personality we call him. My wife kept txting me all day about how she is concerned about the cat, afraid he is sick. Tonight he is a bit better though - in fact, as I type this he just brought his toy over to me so we can play fetch.

My ears keep popping and my right ear is totally muffled but I think that is related to congestion of course.

Speaking of alternative methods of earthquake prediction - the reason I came to the thread is because of the X-class flare that the sun released today. It will be an interesting next 5-7 days or so perhaps.

Besides a mag 6 here and there, Earth has been very quiet the past several weeks.

reply to post by nydsdan

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Hi!
I read about the solar flare right after I posted.

That happened once before. We kept waiting for a good sized earthquake because of the symptoms we were having...and nothing happened.

Someone posted about a solar flare during that time & it made us wonder if there was a connection.
Guess we'll have to wait & see!

If there is a quake too, how will we know which we were feeling?
I guess if the symptoms are stronger than expected, for the size of the quake, then maybe we were feeling both???? Hmmmm.......
WOQ

reply to post by wasobservingquietly

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I can tell you I'm feeling this solar flare hard right now. I've had a serious headache and nausea since I woke up and it won't go away no matter how much medication I pump in my body. What a miserable feeling, I get headaches often but nothing quite like this. Anyone else having a really crappy day?

reply to post by wasobservingquietly

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Well, see, I have been aware of my sensitivity to the solar stuff longer than the quakes but mostly it is just from experience that I can tell the difference, but then there are times that I cannot tell what is going on. I know it will be one or the other. Observing of patterns and animal behaviour is important too. Like my cat is driving me insane right about now, and the neighbourhood cats are acting oddly as well!

I would love to write out a better detailed example but I cannot sit at the comp that long. I shall do that sometime after the geomagnetic storm dies down a bit and I feel more clearheaded. Glad to be able to answer your questions though. I hope your hubby is doing okay.

reply to post by TMG333

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How are you feeling by now?
Do you usually have headaches during solar flares?
WOQ

reply to post by rbkruspe

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There sure is a lot for us to learn & be aware of!!!

We both had a pretty good day yesterday!
Then not quite two hours ago, hubby called from work on his lunch break.
Said he was starting to feel awful again, like something is building.

It's such a roller coaster ride!
The cats have been mostly sleeping, they do that a lot anymore!
The young one was trilling & wanted attention for a short time last night, but it was only for a few minutes.
She was over it so fast, that we joked about it & wondered if cats can have false alarms!!!

How are you feeling today? Do your symptoms taper off as the flare subsides?
I wonder over how broad of an area it could be felt?
I would think fairly large. We're in PA.
We were really exhausted last night, but we did too much this weekend trying to get caught up!
I don't usually get headaches, so I can't imagine how anyone that does can even function!
Especially if they are eq & flare triggered! Hubby gets them sometimes, but usually only around a 6 eq or higher.
Hope you're feeling better by now!

WOQ

reply to post by wasobservingquietly

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I am a little better today, just a mild headache at the moment but I think that's just my caffeine withdrawal telling me to go make my afternoon tea. I started suffering from frequent headaches/migraines back in high school and at the time I was most definitely not paying any attention to what the sun or the earth was doing. Several doctors and medications later we still had absolutely no explanation as to what was triggering them. I've been dealing with it for about 12 years now and I still don't know exactly what brings them on. I had a few years where they were fairly quiet between about 2006 and 2009, and they have started to pick back up since. I guess since I don't know what my triggers are and modern medicine hasn't been much of a help I have to assume that it's something more unconventional.

reply to post by wasobservingquietly

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Just been insanely tired for the last two days for no real reason at all, yet unable to sleep much at night as usual. Just got up from attempting to nap, throwing in the towel on that idea. That's about the only thing unusual I have to report.

Hello everyone,

sorry I've been off the thread recently. Just wanted to say that purely from a personal perspective, I have had no specific indicators of anything major coming up. However, I sometimes miss ones that other people get, so by all means please post if you feel anything is indicated. The more specific you can be (if possible), the better.

Meanwhile I'd just like to make an observation. As of the time of writing this post, there has been no magnitude 7.0 (Mw) or greater quake anywhere in the world since April 12. So, it's been 111 days since that last one, and this is a lot longer than the "average" between mag 7s of around 23 days.

As part of a bigger project that I'm still working on, I did a review of quake intervals for all the events listed in the centennial earthquake catalogue (available in the USGS database as a pdf at this link), and of the 1553 magnitude 7 (or greater) quakes listed there from 1/1/1900 to 12/31/1999, only 19 occurred at intervals of 110 days or more. (ie Time from one until the next one was more than 109 days.)

In other words, on average we can expect a 110-day (plus) interval between two mag 7 quakes to occur only about once every five years.

The longest time between two such quakes in the 20th century was from Sept 12, 1965 to March 12, 1966 -- six months (or 181 days, to be precise).

Now, some might imagine that if there is a well-over-average time between larger quakes, then when one happens it will be a huge one. While that's not such an unreasonable line of thinking, I found no evidence to actually support it. In fact, the size of our next quake could just as easily be another low-range mag 7 event. In most cases that has been the way it has gone.

The problem is trying to figure out where the next mag 7-plus might be! So if you have any inklings, please post.

Regards,

Mike

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