Hi Cathryn,

Here's your formula to success if you think your ear tones are from earthquakes or you want to figure out whether they are or not.

You hear an ear tone.
Note how many seconds it is.
Multiply the seconds X 37.5 miles for distance from where you were when you heard it.
Your right ear is for north and northeast.
Your left ear is for south and southwest.
Depending on how loud your ear tone was you need to find a quake at the correct distance, in the correct direction and the correct magnitude to match your ear tone volume.
Once you've located the suspect quake, write down the latitude and longitude of its location.
Put it into the distance calculator such as 39.00N and 121.50W.
Then put in your coordinates, which are: 36.97N - 121.89W.
Hit the enter button and in a few seconds it tells you the straight line mileages from your location to the earthquake epicenter.
Take the distance and divide it by 37.5 and if it equals the number of seconds your ear tone was heard, then you have a match.

From doing this for several years I memorized the distances after mapping them, so such places as Petrolia for instance for me is 6 seconds away.
To map, just buy a Rand McNally CA road map, use a ruler and a yellow highlighter and make some nice circles and you'll be surprised how interesting it looks. You'll instantly know which places have earthquakes and those that don't and thus you narrow down the possiblities in one easy glance.

It takes time, patience, some knowledge of geology and seismology. Most of which you probably already know.

I hope this helps,

Petra

• Straight Line Distance Calculator