Give Us A Good Weapon To Hit Earthquakes

Relating To The 7.4 Turkey Earthquake

First of all, we would like to thank you for visiting our new web page, and giving us great moral support. Since many people, including my wife and younger daughter, asked me whether or nor I predicted the 7.4 Turkey earthquake on August 17, I am writing this essay. The answer to that question is that I predicted this earthquake to two witnesses, but did not report to both the USGS and the public because the general area window of the prediction, 25~45 N and 15~65 E, was huge, and the most likely area window, Southern Iran, was questionable. Thus, I had to wait to see. The following is my unreported prediction. 7/30/1999 Pasadena More likely time is 7/30~8/25. The most likely time is 8/5~8/20. More likely size is >= 6.5 ML. The most likely size is >=7 ML. More likely latitude is 25~40 N. The most likely latitude is 25~30 N. More likely longitude is 25~65E. The most likely longitude is 50~65E. Zhonghao Shou and the earthquake data are: 99/08/17 00:01:38 40.69N 29.82E 10.0 7.4Mw B TURKEY. Comparing the prediction with the data, you will see that all time windows and size windows are correct, but the most likely area windows are wrong. You may be interested in the details of the whole process. The following is my reply. I found the 7.4 Turkey earthquake cloud from satellite images on July 16. From 5:00 to 9:00 (Greenwich Time), a line-shaped cloud was springing up gradually in a vast clear space near Sri Lanka over the India Ocean. It lay from about (5N, 80 E) to (7N, 87E), or was about 805 km long. Obviously, it was a large earthquake cloud. According to my prediction model, its time would be within 49 days after July 16 , and its size should be bigger than 6 at least, and even more than 7, and the location would be from Iran to Italy including Turkey and Greece where the tail of the cloud pointed toward: northwest from Sri Lanka. The above decisions were not very difficult for me to make from the satellite images. A serious impediment was that I needed a surface wind velocity distribution, or a detailed infrared image to trace the epicenter, but I did not have either one. One may think that exhibiting the above prediction might help some people, but I do not think so. I reported my 6.1 Afghanistan earthquake prediction to both the USGS and the L. A Times on January 5, 1998, but that tragedy was not avoided. Moreover, our prediction practice shows that predicting earthquakes is possible, but to reach our target, a successful evacuation, we have numerous works to do. The following are some concrete problems which needed to be overcome: (1) Since earthquake clouds are tiny, a 18 cm x 24 cm image should cover less than a 25 degree x 30 degree land, and have necessary details. Moreover, wind can change cloud shapes, so images should exhibit hourly at least. Unfortunately, I have not found a web site, whose satellite images are suitable for earthquake prediction in general. (2) Because winds can carry earthquake vapor or an earthquake cloud for several thousands kilometers, an hourly surface current distribution is necessary, and those data should keep at least two days. However, I have not found a suitable site. (3) According to my model, earthquake vapor contains high temperature, and erupts from a hole, so the best method is to set up an observatory net to detect where the hole locates, and how much vapor erupts, and to monitor earthquake clouds in the sky, and to measure a daily underground temperature distribution. This method will be able to avoid some serious problems, for example, sometimes satellite instruments do not work well, weather clouds interrupt earthquake clouds, and wind carry earthquake vapor far away. To overcome the above problems, Wenying and I have tried many times, for example, we wrote Mr. Clinton in 1994, Mr. Buffett in 1997, the chief of the USGS, and many seismologists, but no one has helped us. Like a soldier needs a good weapon, we also need a good " weapon " to get necessary data, then to hit earthquakes. Otherwise, our work is still limited in a few cases, in which winds are not strong. Many people want us to predict earthquakes for where they live. We enjoy doing it, but we need help, a good " weapon ". Finally, we should thank Mr. Harrington, and Mr. Terri Gregory for offering wind- data addresses, and Dundee University, UK for satellite images

Appendix:

Click to show four images of the 7.4 Turkey cloud from 6:00 to 15:00

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