Hi Martin. In this world a lot of people make a lot of claims. Whenever extraordinary claims are made extraordinary proof must be presented.

When ever someone makes a prediction for a specific area I try to find that area by latitude/longitude and then make a catalog search of that area for the number of past quakes that have occurred there. I have found that in 8 out of 10 times there will be a quake of magnitude 3.5 to 5.0M on almost any given day of the month. Many are using past history of quakes for a specific area and there is nothing wrong with this, as it is a good foundation by which an earthquake can, or may predicted.

I have made a few predictions in my time. The method I use is using a combination of the data sites provided by USGS and the past history for that area. When I make a prediction/forecast I will forecast the location by latitude/longitude plus or minus 10 miles and give a name of the closest landmark known by people. I will also give the magnitude. For quakes below 5.0M I allow myself a half of a magnitude. For quakes above 5.0M I allow one whole magnitude. I give the time of the quake plus or minus 24 hours.

When dealing with quakes above 6.0M the forecast must be as close to the time, location, and magnitude that one can make if that forecast is to be of any use. I could not and would not reasonably expect any governing body to act upon a forecast of a quake occurring in the next 10 days, at a location plus or minus 50 miles with only a 75% chance of occurring.

As to foreshocks I myself have never really been able to tell a foreshock from an earthquake that is nothing more then an earthquake. The one exception to this was the Hector Mine quake. There were on three separate occasions where a series of quakes could be considered as foreshocks. The first was in 1974. There were a series of 8 quakes that started on 07/30 and ended on 08/02. None were over 4.0Ms and none listed were below 2.0Ms. The second such period was in 1992 and these started on 07/05 and ended on07/09 for a total of 12 quakes. For the 1992 series the largest was a 5.4M and was on 07/05. The series for the Hector Mine quake in which there were 2 foreshocks listed started on 10/15 and ended on 10/16 and all of the quakes beyond this date were aftershocks. The first was a 3.00M. I know in fact that there were 13 quakes before the main event, but are not listed because they are below 2.0Ms. It was the way the quakes were progressing that I felt very strongly that there was going to be a major quake in the area. I had the time and location as close as anyone could get, but I missed the magnitude by a long shot.

You appear to be comfortable with your forecasts, but I would like to suggest that you start tightening up your forecasts. Close the time frame, location and magnitude down to a useful forecast. In all truthfulness if I were a person who had the power to evacuate a city, or at the very least put out a notification that a large quake will occur it would have to be close to a 98% probability and only after you have proven you have a excellent track record. Stay with it and refine your method.

There in one other problem that you most likely will never be able to change. A couple of years ago I did a little informal survey about people wanting to know about a future major. I did this in the mobile home park I live. About 80% of them didn’t want to know. Take Care…Don in creepy town.