Re: The Southern California earthquake record-breaking drought
Posted by Canie on April 28, 2002 at 12:30:11:

Here's a table I lifted off the Trinet reports for quarterly activity:


Totals listed below apply to the area within a polygon bounded by
the following latitude, longitude pairs:
35.0N, 121.0W; 37.0N, 119.0W; 37.0N, 115.0W; 32.5N, 115.0W; and 32.5N, 121.0W.
        1st quarter     2nd quarter     3rd quarter     4th quarter
                 all     3.0+        all     3.0+     all        3.0+      all     3.0+
1986     3,040   16      2,865   19       6,634  192      2,300   38
1987     1,679   24      1,887   36       2,341   38       5,748  198
1988     2,749   40      2,128   45       2,195   30       2,208   27
1989     2,528   46      2,340   21       2,323   19       2,335   26
1990     2,850   56      2,293   43       1,859   27       2,039   31
1991     1,679   10      1,843   32       2,081   21       2,337   27
1992     3,389   37     10,084  741     25,849  808   9,775  181
1993     4,799   41      5,152   58       5,039   46       4,419   34
1994    10,735  418    5,766   42       5,221   48       4,813   39
1995     3,639   28      3,788   37        8,252   88       7,733   49
1996     5,735   56      3,966   32        3,690   23       4,660   50
1997     3,699   39      3,276   54        3,193   31       2,443   27
1998     3,590   56      2,830   27        2,655   37       2,352   29
1999     2,253   35      2,546   58        2,555   36       8,927+ 584
2000     5,295   72      4,441   75        3,964   38       3,257   31

If it doesn't look right, there's a link below to the page with the original table. This is the most recent table of events that I could find.

From looking at the above and relating to low seismicity - it appears that the low seismicity can carry on for as much as a year or so before something significant.