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NASA Quakesim Predicts 15 Out of 16 CA Quakes
Saint Aardvark writes "NASA's QuakeSim project has successfully predicted15 out of 16 of California's earthquakes with magnitude > 5, including 11 since the map was published in 2002. "So far, the technique has only missed one earthquake, a magnitude of 5.2, on June 15, 2004, under the ocean near San Clemente Island.""
How many did it predict that never happened?
That means it won't be able to predict Quake IV :(
Do they have a multiplayer version of this? Will it run on Linux? ;)
fact is, though, this is a big step in the right direction. To successfully predict a quake, you need location, magnitude and time. They've got location down and time vaguely constrained (article doesn't state time effect, other than a quake in this location within 10 years) and a lower limit on magnitude (at least 5). That's better than nothing. and certainly something to use as a starting point for future modelling efforts.
Check out the archived version here
From the blurb:
Following recent seismic activity in California and the threatened eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington State. Forum takes a look at scientific advancements in the study of earthquakes and volcanoes.
Host: Michael Krasny
Guests:
It's easy to "predict" something that you cause yourself.
/me puts on tinfoil hat.
I predit that I will put my tinfoil hat on!
Ooh, I must be psychic or something!
They're just putting their earthquake machines through the paces before they use it to ensure W's re-election, and to make a tidy profit for Haliburton, which owns a lot of soon-to-be-coastal property along the California-Nevada border.
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
The article is vague. No mention of whether there were any false positives. People will get fed up really quickly if told to evacuate and no quake comes.
Also, it's not clear to me that what their predicting ("hotspots") is the same thing as predicting when an earthquake will happen. How long do individual "hotspots" exist in one place?
Still, earthquake and other Earth-sci prediction simulations can be useful. Just probably better for long-term planning than individual predictions.
I wouldn't exactly say they predicted these quakes. From what the article says, it seems like they just have a list of places where they say a >5 quake will occur between 2000 and 2010. Whoop-dee-fucking-doo. Anything under a 6 is less annoying to a Californian than a fly buzzing around your house. For anything over a 6.5 or so, being this accurate about WHERE the quake will occur is next to useless if you can't be more accurate about WHEN it will occur.
This is not meant to diminish the accomplishments of these researchers. I'm sure this is a very important stepping stone to greater advances. However, this won't be useful to most people until they can predict with much greater accuracy the magnitude of the quake and the timeframe in which it will occur.
This sounds like a really cool endeavor, but why is this funded by NASA? NASA takes a lot of flak for using up lots of money and being a big administration, and its not surprising to see why with projects like this under its wings.
In the end, shouldn't such earthquake research be under a different organization?
The space unintentionally left unblank.
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
int lat, lon;
for (lat = -90; lat <= 90; lat++)
for (lon = -180; lon <= 179; lon++)
printf("prediction: lat=%d +/- 0.5, lon=%d +/- 0.5\n", lat, lon);
}
The articles cites don't speak much on methodology beyond using historical data (since 1932) to predict areas where magnitude 5+ earthquakes are likely. It would be interesting to read about the methods and determine if they can predict larger (6 - 6.5+) damaging earthquakes of a larger magnitude. Or more significantly, earthquakes whose damage potential (as measured using the Mercalli scale) is high.
Geologists have been using historical data to predict future potential for many years. Stream flow data are used to predict flood potential; historic hurricane landfall data are used to predict beach erosion potential; lahar ages are used to predict volcanic mud flow damage potential.
What is more useful that merely predicting areas where magnitude 5+ earthquakes are likely to occur is predicting the frequency and areal extent of damage potential -- Mercalli intensity VIII +, roughly correlating to Richter magnitude 6.5+.
Then again, we Americans continue to rebuild on 100 year flood plains, hurricane-savaged barrier islands and earthquake-prone areas. The engineering geology I learned was to avoid areas where Mother Nature is going to win in the long run.