I talk just about every day by E-mail with people in forecasting groups around the world. And, I believe that researchers could probably tell that some of the more powerful earthquakes were on the way based on strain accumulation and foreshock data. One of the reasons that this and many other types of forecasting efforts are not moving along very fast is because most of the forecasting groups appear to be working independently of one another. They don’t share data, compare notes, or try to put together some type of cohesive effort combining various types of data etc.

Government should be trying to get people in the scientific community to work together to do those types of things. But earthquake forecasting appears to be one of those sciences that is being largely stopped in its tracks by government and international scientific community politics. Scientists don’t know how to deal with the politics involved with earthquake forecasting. And they are generally not interested in learning how to do that. Government officials are content to maintain the status quo. The result is that any progress is slow and difficult.

These are personal opinions.