New Madrid Warning Signs? Please Share.

There is no shortage of threads on the New Madrid Fault. In fact, the one that inspired this is currently sitting on the main page for a top thread. I'd like to make a thread here with a different focus though and perhaps a spot to collect and look at the different reports of Odd behavior in animals or natural signs.

Apparently, the DEEP coal mines of Kentucky have been helpful and enlightening for how this fault is a gift that keeps giving on it's own schedule. It just leaves a LONG period between quakes.


So... What should we be looking for or, more accurately, not ignoring? Well, the New Madrid has a few things which make it different. First, for those who are unfamiliar, here is the past and what people worry about a repeat of....

In 1811/1812, the Fault Complex centered around New Madrid, Missouri had a series of catastrophic quakes. Thankfully, wildlife and primitive farming existed at that point, and little more. The losses were light, but the show is something I can hardly imagine seeing by first hand accounts. Here are the facts though.

Three Main Shocks

December 16, 1811 - Magnitude ~7.7
January 23, 1812 - Magnitude ~ 7.5
February 7, 1812 - Magnitude ~ 7.7

It's happened before 1811-1812

The geologic record of pre-1811 earthquakes reveals that the New Madrid seismic zone has repeatedly produced sequences of major earthquakes, including several of magnitude 7 to 8, over the past 4,500 years.

Source

Numerous links to first person Eyewitness accounts of 1811/12 events

Now what got me is that in the more extensive reading on this event, it wasn't without it's warning signs. If fact, there were an abudance of them. People then had no idea what they were seeing, and so, couldn't have understood that warning signs are what the were watching. The natural world knew though, and animals tried to get away from it for months before the quake series happened.

Many things combined to make the year 1811 the Annus Mirabilis of the West. During the earlier months, the waters of many of the great rivers overflowed their banks to a vast extent, and the whole country was in many parts covered from bluff to bluff. Unprecedented sickness followed. A spirit of change and a restlessness seemed to pervade the very inhabitants of the forest. A countless multitude of squirrels, obeying some great and universal impulse, which none can know but the Spirit that gave them being, left their reckless and gambolling life, and their ancient places of retreat in the north, and were seen pressing forward by tens of thousands in a deep and sober phalanx to the South.

Source

Pardon the language of the time. Comtemporary reports can be a headache, and that sure is part of why. lol... However, reports like the squirells were repeated and involved other critters as well. Reports of odd behavior came from well outside the New Madrid Siesmic Zone.

Another passing reference to animal oddity prior to the quake

This is difficult to lay out with detailed examples as most of what I've read on the mysterious mass movement of animals prior to the quakes came from books, not the net. The above gives a sample and the contemporary reports my links lead out to give more.


So my hope is that we can start collecting together the reports of odd happenings. Not the family tabby acting like she's mad...but things that would cause someone entirely ignorant of ATS or the New Madrid theories to stop, shake their head, and wonder what is causing whatever they're watching happen. One thread yesterday mentioned Geese in MN being a bit off for migration and acting oddly in other ways? Minor...perhaps..but the person reporting it and living there thought it rose to the level of mentioning.

I wonder if there are others like that and we aren't hearing it. If so...Lets share and figure out patterns, IF any, and whether things ARE odd or simply odd to an individual who just hadn't seen a thing themselves before. *IF* The New Madrid is up for another triple play repeat, then millions will be devastated.

Memphis is largely made up of brick and old style construction with no thought ever given to hardening the structures to an Earthquake, for example. Something close to 8? Well.... By reading the effects the last time, I think the topic bears time, attention and some effort to look at objectively and pool our collective observations.

Is the 'zone' building to another show?

The only thing I can think of lately that has been "odd" to me is this...

The day before the Missouri quake I was coming home from St. Louis and making my way to Nashville, TN.

I was in the passenger seat, just woke up and was looking out into the bright warm sun and thinking how pretty the landscape is and then I noticed what looked to be a rainbow around the sun. It was brilliant in color and it was as if I could the aura of the Sun. Pretty! The circled rainbow/aura was not circling close to the sun...no it was distant with its surrounding.

The next thing odd I noticed was there had been a plane who left a trail in the atmosphere and the line went right through the path of the Sun with its bright circled rainbow. The trail was thicker than I normally see it and it had a shadow surrounding it. I thought to myself how odd the atmosphere looked. The next morning I saw the quake had happened..I wondered if I had witnessed some form of atmosphere heating.

reply to post by MamaJ


Hey MamaJ,

Here is an explanation of the sun thingy you witnessed that pretty sunny day......However, keep your eyes to the sky; the next time you look up you just might see some of these radiation refracting anomalies, and warn a person or two.......always enjoy your posts!

science.nasa.gov...

This video may help people understand what to look for. I know it is 45 minutes long but it is worth the watch.

Wrabbit, although this isn't an animal anomaly, it is still something that bugs me that I feel is relevant to the area in question.

Ok take this with a box of salt if you like but here goes:

Fact: one hellva front just rolled over the Miss Valley and SE (spawning tornadoes, lightning etc) - ergo ground is really wet.

Fact: Right now it's overcast with wind in my area (SC) is 18 mph; Brewton AL clear, 15 mph; Godfrey GA clear 10 mph.

Bottom line: trees shake in the wind, roots are in the ground, ground shakes, no?! Wetter the ground, more the helicorders pick up?? Helicorders may/maynot pick up the ground shaking from trees, depending on how sensitive they are set?

That being said, on Feb 19 thru to Feb 21, just before the 4.0 hit MO. on Feb 21 last month, I noticed the helicorders in SC going all wonkers big time. It freaked me out 'cause I hadn't seen them go this wonkers all across the state for so long a time period, so I snooped around, saw that helicorders in other states were going a bit wonkers also, namely, Brewton, AL; Godfrey, GA, Tifton, GA and others. Not so much the VA ones, just the ones around the southern fall line. I didn't have a clue as to what was happening and didn't want to freak anyone else out, so I just let it ride without posting anything. Don't remember what the weather was like.

Now I'm not adept at reading the NMSZ helis, what with trains and fracking and all that going on that can also affect helis, so I'll leave those to ppl that live there, have boots on the ground and have a sense of what's up in those areas.

Here's the link to SC "archived" helicorder data
if you want to get a sense of what I'm talking about. You can check the dates before and after to get a sense of what is "normal" for these buggers. This was not normal.

Now, get this, the helis are going all wonkers again right now.

Now, it may be the wind, it may be something I don't know about, or it maybe something to watch.
I doubt the current weather has anything to do with the telemetry of the data b/c it's basically clear. I haven't seen where a big earth bell ringer quake has occurred - sometimes, like with the big Japan quake, the Earth's bell gets rung hard and she gets stuck on reverb! I don't know, all I know is that I'm keeping my eye on them until someone can come up with a plausible explanation.

Another thing...

When the 4.0 hit, USGS had not posted the tiny precursor micro quakes that preceded it. I happened to notice it when I went back to check on some data and made a comment here.

Notice if you will that there have been 3 miniquakes today Mar 4 posted by USGS.



Interesting indeed.

Here's the SC Helicorder site I use most often. Here's VA's Helicorders; it's unsettling to see that 3 of their 8 sites are down. Here's the CERI mainpage if you want to check things out in your neck of the woods; another CERI site with map, but it can be a pain to use sometimes.

BTW, as far as I know there is no fracking in SC or NC; it's Sunday afternoon, I doubt seriously if any of the quarry's across the state are blasting at this time.

I would love for someone to explain why all these helis are going wonkers!

BTW, I have seen a "herd" of squirrels running for their lives before, about 10-15 of them running straight down the drive right towards us full bore, not in the trees, but on the ground mind you, more scared of what was behind them than us in front of them. It is indeed a sight to behold and unnerving to say the least! This has happened twice to me. At the time we thought it was just coyotes in the area that spooked them, but I may have to rethink that!

Apologies in advance - I truly hope I haven't sidetracked your thread with reference to the critters, but at this point I feel the wonky helis are an anomaly that I've noticed, but not substantial enough to correlate it directly with events in the NMSZ, nor enough to scare the bejesus outta everyone with wonky helis, but enough to make me wonder WTH is going on.

The probability for an earthquake of magnitude 6.0 or greater is significant in the near future, with a 50% chance by the year 2000 and a 90% chance by the year 2040. A quake with a magnitude equal to that of the 1811- 1812 quakes could result in great loss of life and property damage in the billions of dollars. Scientists believe we could be overdue for a large earthquake and through research and public awareness may be able to prevent such losses.

Well that's quite scary!

Earthquakes happen. There's no need to fear such things. Just be prepared in case of such an event.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
I wonder if there are others like that and we aren't hearing it. If so...Lets share and figure out patterns, IF any, and whether things ARE odd or simply odd to an individual who just hadn't seen a thing themselves before. *IF* The New Madrid is up for another triple play repeat, then millions will be devastated.

No idea if this qualifies, but it's free to post, right :-)

I'm ~120 inland from New York City, northeast PA on the west side of the mountains. Over the last week we've had hundreds, and I mean hundreds, of seagulls out here on the river. We do have a handful from time to time, and I know some species live inland, but it was odd enough for me to note it.

It always makes me think of the movies, when huge flocks of birds fly inland before the giant tsunami engulfs NYC :-)

reply to post by mojo2012



I take it you don't work on the 18th floor of any building in that area....
nor does anyone you care about.

reply to post by SCGrits

I left the quote out for space... Your post was so well written and informative. I wouldn't know quite which spot to quote anyway.

I'm also brand new to reading the real time/near real time displays. I really started around the first of the year and just added some from around the world to one of my sites a few weeks ago, so I haven't been sure what is normal and what isn't. I've noticed the same...humming...is really the only way I can describe it. Where the stations are recording a constant state of low activity hour after hour and without any real difference for rising or falling. Just constant. Then entire periods of straight lines and nothing at all unless a real earthquake is recorded. Some of the recent ones in your link are pretty wild for that 'humming' and of course, recording in multiple stations. I don't pay much attention to a single station unless it's a strictly local event..but your examples definitely weren't.

I just wish I knew better by those displays what normal is supposed to look like for the highs and lows of routine cycles or whatever. It's unnerving though. You should see the display for Palmer Station, Ant or Midway Island. lol... There are a few in interesting locations that show some wild local variations. (to say the least) It's an attention grabber when it's across physically separated ones though.

(By the way..You definitely didn't sidetrack my thread.. lol.. I welcome anything that might indicate something we all need to take notice of for the New Madrid being active and your contribution was enlightening.)

Between the storms and now 4 little quakes just today along the Madrid I really think HAARP is messing with crap.

Originally posted by ns9504

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
I wonder if there are others like that and we aren't hearing it. If so...Lets share and figure out patterns, IF any, and whether things ARE odd or simply odd to an individual who just hadn't seen a thing themselves before. *IF* The New Madrid is up for another triple play repeat, then millions will be devastated.

No idea if this qualifies, but it's free to post, right :-)

I'm ~120 inland from New York City, northeast PA on the west side of the mountains. Over the last week we've had hundreds, and I mean hundreds, of seagulls out here on the river. We do have a handful from time to time, and I know some species live inland, but it was odd enough for me to note it.

It always makes me think of the movies, when huge flocks of birds fly inland before the giant tsunami engulfs NYC :-)

Thank you for adding that.

One thing that struck me about reading books on the New Madrid quakes and the reports everyone figured might be related long after the fact, was how UNrelated it all would have appeared at the time, in any one place. Birds here, Squirrels there, Rats in another place. In hindsight and taken together to suggest a pattern to the known event, I have to admit there sure seemed to be one alright.

So...by all means, I appreciate that. If it was odd enough to notice without ever looking for it...it's worth noting. Some of the oddity reports put together after New Madrid were of critters doing odd things clear out into the Eastern Ohio Valley...and of course we didn't have the population for people to even see much back then. So, who knows how much actually did happen that would have indicated something seriously out of balance before they hit?

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


I am trying to post a link for an article. First I apologize if somewhere else on ATS this has been noted. Second I apoligize if I do not poast link properly.
The link is about a strange odor in the west. The odor was so foul, about 250 people became ill. Bad odors are usually a precursor to earthquakes. So, here goes:
www.azcentral.com...

reply to post by MoEskiMo


That is certainly interesting. It's a bit in the wrong direction for the New Madrid or this area of faults. You might consider doing a thread about it though. It could make for interesting material on that and be a great initial thread. I believe there have been a couple major odor issues in the NYC/NJ area as well, which I'm not sure were ever explained.

It does make one wonder... I'm serious about a new thread though. I'd love to hear more background and info. It sounds like a real mystery out there.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


Just Google "dutchsinse" as this guy is probably the number one leader in what is going on in that area as he lives right in The Zone.

Here is his link: dutchsinse

reply to post by poundpuppy

Wow.. Thank you for that link. It went into my news favorites without hesitation. He has a great deal of new material and perspective on the Arkansas fracking and where it may relate and ... not quite the topic here, but some of the best Tornado outbreak maps and just HOW ODD the recent outbreak was for location and area that I've yet seen anywhere. It looks like one of the sites I may quickly be checking on a regular basis.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000

Thank you for adding that.

One thing that struck me about reading books on the New Madrid quakes and the reports everyone figured might be related long after the fact, was how UNrelated it all would have appeared at the time, in any one place. Birds here, Squirrels there, Rats in another place. In hindsight and taken together to suggest a pattern to the known event, I have to admit there sure seemed to be one alright.

So...by all means, I appreciate that. If it was odd enough to notice without ever looking for it...it's worth noting. Some of the oddity reports put together after New Madrid were of critters doing odd things clear out into the Eastern Ohio Valley...and of course we didn't have the population for people to even see much back then. So, who knows how much actually did happen that would have indicated something seriously out of balance before they hit?

Well, officially we are out of the immediate projected affected area for New Madrid so maybe they are coming to a "safe zone"? I can hope anyway....

Thanks for the thread. I'm pretty in tune with the animal world and will keep an eye out.

reply to post by ns9504

Your point here reminded me of something so I hopped off and grabbed the graphic to show.



You're definitely outside the effect zone in Eastern PA, but did you know by how small a margin you're outside it?

The above is a shakemap scenario generated to show what the 1811/1812 quakes would likely look and feel like with modern technology map it. Interesting isn't it?? Los Angeles can have a big one and they'll feel something out across the Western U.S. However, look at what the geology of the center of the nation does compared to the sandy soil of the West?

Canada to the Gulf and clear out to the Atlantic and Northern Florida. Of course...that isn't damage, but when the reports say the New Madrid quake series rang Church bells in Philadelphia, I guess this map suggests they aren't over stating matters. It would appear Earthquakes are like Real Estate. Location Location Location. Well... Location sure is nasty here, eh?

Sorry no time to read whole thread.

Umm, flying lava bombs?

reply to post by TheMindWar


You mean for what the map shows? No.. The star represents the Epicenter of a New Madrid centered Quake in the high 7 range. Where it isn't white, people feel the quake and the further from pale blue one gets toward the center, the more that feeling turns to actual damage...until you reach Memphis..or what people would have called Memphis in the past tense. I don't think it would exist as a recognizable city after a quake as the map depicts.