Will the Earth Move On Dec. 3? Midwest Rattled by Prediction --- A Scientist Expects a Quake; Some Map Plans to Flee, And Entrepreneurs Profit ---- By Michael J. McCarthy Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal
But even as Memphians whoop it up, the prediction that the Big One may come in December is triggering tremors up and down the Mississippi Valley. Shaken, thousands of people are crowding into earthquake survival classes. In Arnold, Mo., 3,000 people showed up for one course. In Missouri and Arkansas, some schools and businesses have announced plans to close in early December. Entrepreneurs are hawking quake insurance, survival kits and gas-line safety gadgets. Some people are planning to flee. "You can't run from everything," says Tammy McCormick, a nurse in Blytheville, Ark., who will take her two youngsters and spend several days with relatives in North Carolina. "But it seems stupid to stay on a fault line with a prediction like this." Everybody talks about the San Andreas fault in California. But the Midwest actually has had three of the most powerful earthquakes on this continent. In 1811 and 1812, along a 120-mile zig-zag formation called the New Madrid fault, a series of quakes ravaged the Midwest. Researchers estimate those earthquakes ranked stronger than 8 on the Richter Scale, which hadn't been invented yet. They were more than 10 times greater than the 7.1 quake that rocked California's Bay Area last October. Church bells rang as far away as Boston. Chimneys crumbled in Cincinnati. And as tons of soil and rock bed pitched and rolled in a seismic frenzy, new waterfalls spiked up, causing part of the mighty Mississippi River to flow backward for several hours. The New Madrid (pronounced MAD-rid) fault still has 150 small, mostly unfelt, earthquakes a year. In the next 10 years, experts warn, the area has a 33% chance of a quake measuring 7.1. That could produce billions of dollars in damage and thousands of casualties. "We're overdue for one in the 6s and low 7s," says David Stewart, an earthquake expert at Southeast Missouri State University. Over the years, a few pinpoint-on-the map towns have tried to capitalize on the little-known fault. New Madrid, Mo., the fault's namesake, draws tourists to a museum with exhibits on the 19th century devastation. And Paragould, Ark., has held earthquake festivals with events like the "Miss Faultless" beauty contest. But as Monday, Dec. 3, approaches, the whole matter is becoming more serious. That's because the predictor has gained credibility in some important circles for his work on the climate. Iben Browning, a 72-year-old scientist, predicted October's Bay Area quake a week before it happened, say people who heard him speak to the Equipment Manufacturers Institute. And he predicted "geological danger" on Sept. 19, 1985, along a band of latitude that included Mexico City -- where a massive quake struck on that day. Mr. Browning, who has a Ph.D. in physiology, genetics and bacteriology, writes a climate newsletter out of New Mexico. He has clients, such as PaineWebber Inc., who have long paid for his wisdom on how the weather will affect their agricultural investments. Since 1971, Mr. Browning says, he has picked the correct dates of four large earthquakes, two volcanoes -- and one day with both a volcano and an earthquake. He bases his forecasts on tidal forces caused by the positions of the sun and the moon -- an old theory, critics say, that doesn't wash. On Dec. 3, those forces are expected to be at a 27-year high. Mr. Browning says that will exert pressure that could trigger faults already ripe to fail. The New Madrid area has a 50-50 chance of producing at least a 7 quake on Dec. 3, give or take a day or two on either side, Mr. Browning says. At that time, a similar quake has a lesser chance of occurring on California's San Andreas or Hayward faults, according to Mr. Browning, and an 8.2 quake in Tokyo has a greater chance. Skepticism abounds. "No responsible scientist can predict an exact day for an earthquake," says Brian Mitchell, a quake expert at St. Louis University, echoing the majority opinion. But Mr. Browning shouldn't be written off so quickly, says Southeast Missouri State's Mr. Stewart, who recently spent four days with Mr. Browning. "He has a methodology that can determine, plus or minus a window of a day or two, an enhanced probability of a volcano or an earthquake in certain latitudes," says Mr. Stewart. "No one else has been able to replicate it, but that doesn't mean it's wrong." Mr. Browning says it's not easy being on record with predictions that few other scientists will support. "I feel like a lonely little petunia in a cabbage patch," he says. But asked if he enjoys being right, he says, "It's the only damn thing that matters. If one is a business consultant, they don't pay you for being wrong." Plenty of other business people are cashing in on his prediction. Insurance salespeople are peddling earthquake coverage to homeowners and businesses. Salespeople from a Memphis company pop up at survival seminars with a device (for $259 and up) that turns off gas lines when a quake hits. And entrepreneurs are marketing two kinds of earthquake T-shirts in Memphis. One says, "I'm staying," the other, "I'm leaving." All of this has changed life in places like Blytheville, Ark. (pop: 24,314), tucked amid vast flat farmland, right at the corner of the Arkansas, Tennessee and Missouri borders. So many people plan to skip town on Dec. 3 that the Flexible Technologies tubing plant already plans to shut down for two days, at a cost of thousands of dollars. Says Jimmy Connell, plant superintendent, "It's going to be a ghost town around here." Robert Edwards, a Blytheville fireman who teaches seminars in earthquake survival, has become a hot property. For five years, most of his classes were lightly attended. Now his phone-answering machine says he is almost completely booked through October. For one recent class, he was in Osceola, Ark. It is 9 a.m. on a rainy Saturday, and 325 Osceolans, gripping legal pads and spiral notebooks, fill the high school auditorium for an all-day session on earthquake preparedness. With his booming voice, Mr. Edwards lays out a grim scenario: "One hundred and fifty thousand dead in Memphis instantly -- instantly. And all the federal emergency help is going to go there and St. Louis. You have to be prepared to take complete care of yourself for 24 hours to two weeks. You may be five to six months without power." After the seminar, two elderly sisters, both widows, split on what to do. Fearing their home will be looted, Bess Mann, 86 years old, wants to ride it out. But her sister, Hallie Peterson, 83, wants to stay with their nephew in Mississippi. Scared that the big Memphis-Arkansas bridge that spans the Mississippi River will collapse in a quake, she's charting an alternate route two hours out of her way. School districts in Earle and Wilson, Ark., have announced closings around Dec.
prediction methods;earthquake preparedness;quake insurance;earthquake expert;federal emergency help;new madrid fault;national earthquake prediction evaluation cuncil;earthquake survival classes