Well, 2016 has now become part of history.
Just for the record, there was not a single magnitude 8 (Mw) or bigger quake in the entire year. I just checked the USGS/NEIC database
HERE and confirmed that the biggest event in 2016 was the mag 7.9 Mw on Dec 17 that I noted
above. (If you wish, you can use the above link to do your own search.)
We tend to average a bit less than one mag 8 (or bigger) quake per year. There have been 83 in the past 100 years (since 1/1/17), so as we have some
years with two or more, it's not unusual that we get the occasional year without any. Or even consecutive years, such as the four-year breaks with no
mag 8 quakes in 1925-1928, 1953-1956, and 1990-1993.
While the 21st century has been rather busy, with 21 mag 8 or bigger quakes since 2000, the last time we had a quake in that range was on Sept 16,
2015, when there was a
mag 8.3 Mw near Illapel, Chile. And
that was the only mag 8-plus quake in 2015.
There was also only one in 2014: a mag 8.2 also in Chile,
94 km NW of
Iquique.
In 2013, there were two: an 8.3 in the Sea of Okhotsk in May (which was very deep and did no real harm), and an 8.0 a couple of weeks later in June,
in the Solomon Islands.
I've seen plenty of posts and threads on this site asserting that the number of big quakes has been increasing. As I mentioned above, the first decade
and a half of the 21st century has been over-average if we look at 100 years of data, but one century is really a very short time geologically. Also,
there is going to be a fair amount of variance. We had 21 quakes in 16 years or so (from the beginning of 2000), which works out at about 1.3 per
year. But we've also gone more than 15 months since the last one.
The point I'm making is that just because we did not have a mag 8(-plus) quake in 2016, it doesn't automatically follow that we'll get one this year.
Statistically, the odds are greater -- because there has to be one sooner or later -- but factually? No. We could get none. Or we might see one, or
two, three, or even more.
But there are more factors to consider and I'll address some in the next post.