Hi All,

I think we have to ask at this point in time, what is Parkfield? Parkfield in my eyes and from many trips there, and vast research only represents one thing, the outcome of the dream of one man, it is Hope itself.

Senator Harrison S.c.h.m.i.t.t saw such success in weather prediction and having an interest in earthquake warnings made the suggestion to NASA that they create an experimental location. It was with Hope alone that there might be some real success in this endeavor.

While millions of dollars have been spent using everything in data collection and a lot of terrifically bright minds toward this endeavor, the launch of success has yet to occur. In my conversations with the Parkfield Four as I call them, each one will tell you Parkfield has been a success and perhaps to them it is, but not for us. How can such a disparity be present?

When we look at the achievements in the process of the Parkfield Experiment, it cannot ever be considered a failure. This is so because in the "process" they learned how to set up such an experiment which is very vast. But there is a "next step" in the Parkfield process, the one not yet taken, the road yet to be walked. This is to create another Parkfield, but in a new far more active area and one that has a far greater potential for a much larger earthquake.

Can you imagine walking in the shoes of these men? To work diligently for twenty years and perhaps to have Mother Nature give you her last lesson in providing an earthquake in Coalinga, so nearby? Though there to date as far as I know has been no paper indicating if any of the Parkfield instruments detected the Coalinga quake before it occurred, it would be nice to know if there were some kind of precursory data.

While I have been told that studying micro-earthquakes over a period of time is inself a learning experience, we do have to ask after you reach 10,000 or so, what more can you learn? Little I suspect.

While a cursory glance at little Parkfield it would lead anyone to say this dream of Harrison's has become a nightmare in length, let us not throw away the Parkfield experiment, but look at the project as a whole. It is a working classroom for many seismologists who chose this area to study; it has readily available data collection from anywhere in the world, it is one of the birthplaces of teaching earthquake preparedness and the only place in the USA that ever advised the citizens about earthquake warnings. These are the best accomplishments to date.

In great sincerity I have to say Thank You to Dr. Thomas McEvilly, Dr. Alan Lindh, Dr. William Bakun, Dr. John Langbein and Dr. Andrew Michael. The gift of the work, the excellence in monitoring and data collection, the strides forward and the years of disappointments have shaped their lives and their careers. We are the recipients of what they have generously shared with us and let us not be so negative in our thoughts, assessments or conclusions in a job well done, despite so many obstacles.

Parkfield is a living dream of one man who was the last to walk on the Moon. A man who achieved so much in his life, to walk in his shoes could only be the aspiration of someone like Einstein. Harrison is a shining example of what Hope and Humanitarianism are.

I only knew Harrison for a very short period of time, but I caught the wave of enthusiasm, the spirit of bright promise and the hope that one day earthquake warnings will indeed be given, accepted by the public in their best interest and the sadness that accompanies earthquakes will be dimishined by the work of some very valiant geoscientists.

Petra

(I had to put the periods in Harrison's last name as the computer thinks S.c.h.m.i.t.t is something else and won't let me post it.)