KY Has Been Experiencing Quite an Uptick in Earthquake Activity

Let's take a walk back through local history to a time when a business consultant's prediction about earthquakes turned this entire region on its ear.

The 1990 Iben Browing Earthquake Prediction

Author Iben Browning snagged his "15 minutes of fame" in 1990 by saying the New Madrid Fault would unleash the big one on December 2nd or 3rd of that year. (By the way, on December 2nd, 1990, I was below ground level at the bottom of the then-newly renovated and now-demolished Roberts Stadium in Evansville. Not where you want to be if there's been a quake prediction and you're well within in the zone.)

A self-proclaimed "climatologist"--which still didn't make him an earthquake expert--Browning, with his prediction, did stimulate interest in the New Madrid faultline even if his prediction never came to pass. If nothing else, he increased awareness.

Then again, the best you can do when your earthquake awareness is increased is to know where to go if a significant one occurs. You can get a lead time on a storm system but not a quake.

A Recent Uptick in Kentucky Earthquakes

Interestingly enough, here we are about a week and a half removed from the anniversary of Browning's prediction, and we're seeing reports of multiple more minor quakes over the last couple of weeks. The Kentucky Geological Survey expects between two and four magnitude 3.0 quakes every year, so this is significant:

The Kentucky Geological Survey posts seismic recordings on its website. In the meantime, I'll be interested to hear what seismologist Seth Carpenter tells KET about what this "earthquake cluster" could mean.