#earthquakelights — Public Fediverse posts

NatureWorldNews explains Earthquake Lights (EQL): rare luminous displays linked to stressed rocks releasing electrical charges—seen before/during quakes. Scientists compare historical reports and modern footage as they probe causes. Read more: https://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/61132/20240329/what-earthquake-lights-march-29.htm 🌋✨🔬 #EarthquakeLights #Seismology #Science

NatureWorldNews explains Earthquake Lights (EQL): rare luminous displays linked to stressed rocks releasing electrical charges—seen before/during quakes. Scientists compare historical reports and modern footage as they probe causes. Read more: https://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/61132/20240329/what-earthquake-lights-march-29.htm 🌋✨🔬 #EarthquakeLights #Seismology #Science

NatureWorldNews explains Earthquake Lights (EQL): rare luminous displays linked to stressed rocks releasing electrical charges—seen before/during quakes. Scientists compare historical reports and modern footage as they probe causes. Read more: https://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/61132/20240329/what-earthquake-lights-march-29.htm 🌋✨🔬 #EarthquakeLights #Seismology #Science

NatureWorldNews explains Earthquake Lights (EQL): rare luminous displays linked to stressed rocks releasing electrical charges—seen before/during quakes. Scientists compare historical reports and modern footage as they probe causes. Read more: https://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/61132/20240329/what-earthquake-lights-march-29.htm 🌋✨🔬 #EarthquakeLights #Seismology #Science

NatureWorldNews explains Earthquake Lights (EQL): rare luminous displays linked to stressed rocks releasing electrical charges—seen before/during quakes. Scientists compare historical reports and modern footage as they probe causes. Read more: https://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/61132/20240329/what-earthquake-lights-march-29.htm 🌋✨🔬 #EarthquakeLights #Seismology #Science

I did not agree with the Hough paper that attempted to link spook lights with earthquake lights. Here's why. #spookygeology #earthquakelights #seismology #folklore #ghosts sharonahill.com/new-paper-fa...

New paper fails to connect Sum...

I did not agree with the Hough paper that attempted to link spook lights with earthquake lights. Here's why. #spookygeology #earthquakelights #seismology #folklore #ghosts sharonahill.com/new-paper-fa...

New paper fails to connect Sum...

I did not agree with the Hough paper that attempted to link spook lights with earthquake lights. Here's why. #spookygeology #earthquakelights #seismology #folklore #ghosts sharonahill.com/new-paper-fa...

New paper fails to connect Sum...

I did not agree with the Hough paper that attempted to link spook lights with earthquake lights. Here's why. #spookygeology #earthquakelights #seismology #folklore #ghosts sharonahill.com/new-paper-fa...

New paper fails to connect Sum...

New paper fails to connect Summerville spook light to earthquakes

A new article by seismologist Susan Hough was published this week in Seismological Research Letters that attempts to connect the legend of the Summerville, South Carolina spook light to earthquake lights (EQLs) resulting from the faults around Charleston that caused the great 1886 quake. Since Hough is a seismologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, her words carry credibility. News of her findings have been appearing in the media strongly suggesting that the mystery of the Summerville light is solved by this conclusion. It is not.

Unfortunately, my read of it is that this paper shows that Hough didn’t know much about the wider scale of reports of either earth lights (spook or ghost lights) or earthquake lights (luminous phenomenon associated with seismic events). As part of the release of the paper, Hough says that the idea came to her after reading a Halloween-week USGS newsletter with links to “spooky science” studies and that it sparked an idea she hadn’t thought much about – connecting the ghost stories of Summerville to EQLs.

To make a convincing case, the Summerville story would have to be sufficiently unique to other spook light stories and temporally tied to earthquake lights to suggest this cause. Hough’s paper, Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights?, fails to make that case.

The Summerville spook light

Charleston, SC has a lot of ghost stories. The Summerville light is included in common and widespread lore related to a ghost walking the railroad track with a lantern. Associated strange events near Summerville noted by Hough include car engines stopping, frost appearing on windows, audible whispers or voices, strange fingerprints found later on cars, visible apparitions, and cars that “violently shook”. The latter is considered by Hough to be evidence of small shallow, localized quakes.

The paper goes on to talk about a nearby “haunted house” and weakly ties apparition sightings to hallucinogenic gases released (as with Delphi) along faults. This is an unconvincing stretch – the two locations are not comparable. Gases aren’t causing people to hallucinate ghosts.

The earthquake history of the Charleston/Summerville area is obvious, but it is not possible to correlate seismic activity with sightings of the Summerville light because of the lack of recording of small quakes at this time and the inability to cite all reports of the light. Perhaps this can change, maybe a result of this paper – an exciting possibility.

Hough then moves to the similar story of the Maco light of North Carolina. I cannot follow the connection that can be made to seismic activity and this spook light location. Kaczmarek (2003) noted that the Maco light sightings stopped after the tracks were removed. I’m not sure if this is true but maybe the rails are more of a key to the spook light mystery than faults.

Spook lights not by de-fault

It is a mistake to generally link earth (spook) lights to fault lines. The sheer number of earth light locations worldwide have not correlated well to fault areas. It may be possible that some are, and that the mechanism remains difficult to resolve, but earth lights are their own phenomenon separate from EQLs.

Several years ago, I began a database to collect locations of earth lights. I let the work slide as it became overwhelming; I reached an incomplete list of 214 different locations of anomalous earth lights worldwide. These locations consisted of tales (usually multiple occurrences) of near-ground sightings of luminous phenomena. While some of these are dubious, faked, or one-off events, many of these locations became notable for their spook lights – Marfa, Min Min, Joplin, Brown Mountain. This list is biased toward US locations because of my sources (Kaczmarek, Gritzner and Palmer).

I pulled up the database again to cross-check the details. Though I did not confirm all of their characteristics, 129 of 214 were explicitly called “ghost lights”, “spook lights”, or were directly connected with a ghost legend. (I’m not sure about the rest because I haven’t looked into the details enough, but I would bet that many more have associated ghost tales.) Such phenomenon accrue strong local folklore aspects and are thus reinforced over time.

Out of the 129, 34 were associated directly with railroads. And, 31 were described with a distinctive “swinging lantern” movement that people connected to the action of someone walking along the tracks searching for something. (This may be a natural results of our visual capability in tracking light sources in the dark – UFOs are also said to move back and forth in response to our involuntary eye movements.)

Paul Devereux is my favorite resource on earth lights. In his Earth Lights Revelation, he explains that earth lights may be conflated with UFOs, but they appear to be internally produced by the earth in several places where they can be regularly observed. They have been reported across much of human history to the point that they obviously exist, but the mechanism is unclear or has multiple sources. Those mechanisms include electrical phenomenon (including a variant akin to ball lightning), burning gases, and metal deposits (acting like a battery).

Because of their unpredictability and association with haunted areas, earth lights exists on the edge of scientific awareness. This is similar to earthquake lights, which have different characteristics that set them apart from general earth/spook lights. EQLs appear as upward floating orbs, glows, curtains, or flashes. While it is possible that EQLs could be associated with faults, EQLs aren’t associated with railroad tracks and ghost stories which are very much a subset of anomalous light stories.

In short, it has been speculated by some researchers that earth lights may be associated with stressed rock along fault lines (3 such places appeared in my list), but they are not usually associated with earthquake events. If these earth lights appear with coincident earthquakes, that correlation would already have been made long ago. There are many more places that have earth/spook light legends that are not associated with fault lines than places that are.

Interestingly, Hough admits in the paper that earthquake lights are a recognized natural phenomenon. This is a substantive admission since the USGS has always downplayed the idea of EQLs. To me, this shows that the scientific community is now recognizing that the research into EQLs is legitimate.

The press release concludes that “maybe the friendly ghosts are illuminating fault zones in the east”. Again, that is far too much of a reach from this paltry data set.

Unsatisfactory conclusion with a glimmer of hope

The conclusion reached by Hough is baffling. She writes:

Although earthquake phenomena cannot explain every ghost story in every region, considering the lore of the Summerville Light, one is left with three plausible explanations: (1) there was no physical basis for the lore, beyond fanciful imaginations among a local population “spooked” by stories, (2) the legends are true, the ghost of a bereaved wife wandered along a stretch of an old trunk line with a lantern, searching for the head of her decapitated husband, or (3) accounts of apparently supernatural phenomena in and around Summerville can be explained by local earthquake activity starting around or before 1959, including small events that were not recognized as earthquakes.

She favors the last one resulting from ignition of water-soluble gases emitted from faults, like radon or methane, that were then ignited by a spark of static electricity or rock movement. She said that the gases trapped in water droplets might also help explain why these tales of ghost lights seem to occur on dark and misty nights. High humidity is not conductive to static sparks, so this makes little sense.

Left out of these possibilities are other obvious explanations for the stories of famous earth lights. These involve a combination of optical and atmospheric effects, local history and perceptions, social interest in the stories, legend tripping, etc. Speculatively linking the Summerville (and Maco) lights with EQLs in this paper feels misleading and overly simplistic, ignoring the influential social aspects at play with ghost legends and haunted places. And, it may be considered explaining one unknown with another.

Finally, there are two exciting bits in this paper: First, a USGS scientist admits that EQLs are worth scientific attention, and second, it favorably presents the option that EQLs may occur in the seismically stressed area of Charleston, so monitoring and collection of reports of lights should be considered. Hough cites the Enomoto paper, which I also referenced in this recent piece, that provides examples of the stronger evidence emerging in support of EQLs. I am all for more research into this area.

But as for the Summerville light being fault-related, this paper poorly supports that hypothesis. Spooky geology must include the wider, social component to be viable.

References

Devereux, Paul. (1990) Earth Lights Revelation.

Gritzner, Charles F. (2019). North Carolina Ghost Lights and Legends.

Hough, S. E. (2025). Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights? Seismol. Res. Lett. XX, 1–7, doi: 10.1785/0220240442. https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/ssa/srl/article-abstract/doi/10.1785/0220240442/651455/Haunted-Summerville-Ghostly-Lights-or-Earthquake (Paywalled)

Kaczmarek, Dale D. (2003) Illuminating the Darkness: The Mystery of Spooklights.

Palmer, Sean B. (undated) Earth Lights: Spooklights and Ghost Lights. http://inamidst.com/lights/earth

#earthLights #earthquakeLights #folklore #ghostLight #HauntedSummerville #legends #seismology #spookLight #spookyScience #Summervillle #SusanHough

https://sharonahill.com/?p=9241

New paper fails to connect Summerville spook light to earthquakes

A new article by seismologist Susan Hough was published this week in Seismological Research Letters that attempts to connect the legend of the Summerville, South Carolina spook light to earthquake lights (EQLs) resulting from the faults around Charleston that caused the great 1886 quake. Since Hough is a seismologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, her words carry credibility. News of her findings have been appearing in the media strongly suggesting that the mystery of the Summerville light is solved by this conclusion. It is not.

Unfortunately, my read of it is that this paper shows that Hough didn’t know much about the wider scale of reports of either earth lights (spook or ghost lights) or earthquake lights (luminous phenomenon associated with seismic events). As part of the release of the paper, Hough says that the idea came to her after reading a Halloween-week USGS newsletter with links to “spooky science” studies and that it sparked an idea she hadn’t thought much about – connecting the ghost stories of Summerville to EQLs.

To make a convincing case, the Summerville story would have to be sufficiently unique to other spook light stories and temporally tied to earthquake lights to suggest this cause. Hough’s paper, Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights?, fails to make that case.

The Summerville spook light

Charleston, SC has a lot of ghost stories. The Summerville light is included in common and widespread lore related to a ghost walking the railroad track with a lantern. Associated strange events near Summerville noted by Hough include car engines stopping, frost appearing on windows, audible whispers or voices, strange fingerprints found later on cars, visible apparitions, and cars that “violently shook”. The latter is considered by Hough to be evidence of small shallow, localized quakes.

The paper goes on to talk about a nearby “haunted house” and weakly ties apparition sightings to hallucinogenic gases released (as with Delphi) along faults. This is an unconvincing stretch – the two locations are not comparable. Gases aren’t causing people to hallucinate ghosts.

The earthquake history of the Charleston/Summerville area is obvious, but it is not possible to correlate seismic activity with sightings of the Summerville light because of the lack of recording of small quakes at this time and the inability to cite all reports of the light. Perhaps this can change, maybe a result of this paper – an exciting possibility.

Hough then moves to the similar story of the Maco light of North Carolina. I cannot follow the connection that can be made to seismic activity and this spook light location. Kaczmarek (2003) noted that the Maco light sightings stopped after the tracks were removed. I’m not sure if this is true but maybe the rails are more of a key to the spook light mystery than faults.

Spook lights not by de-fault

It is a mistake to generally link earth (spook) lights to fault lines. The sheer number of earth light locations worldwide have not correlated well to fault areas. It may be possible that some are, and that the mechanism remains difficult to resolve, but earth lights are their own phenomenon separate from EQLs.

Several years ago, I began a database to collect locations of earth lights. I let the work slide as it became overwhelming; I reached an incomplete list of 214 different locations of anomalous earth lights worldwide. These locations consisted of tales (usually multiple occurrences) of near-ground sightings of luminous phenomena. While some of these are dubious, faked, or one-off events, many of these locations became notable for their spook lights – Marfa, Min Min, Joplin, Brown Mountain. This list is biased toward US locations because of my sources (Kaczmarek, Gritzner and Palmer).

I pulled up the database again to cross-check the details. Though I did not confirm all of their characteristics, 129 of 214 were explicitly called “ghost lights”, “spook lights”, or were directly connected with a ghost legend. (I’m not sure about the rest because I haven’t looked into the details enough, but I would bet that many more have associated ghost tales.) Such phenomenon accrue strong local folklore aspects and are thus reinforced over time.

Out of the 129, 34 were associated directly with railroads. And, 31 were described with a distinctive “swinging lantern” movement that people connected to the action of someone walking along the tracks searching for something. (This may be a natural results of our visual capability in tracking light sources in the dark – UFOs are also said to move back and forth in response to our involuntary eye movements.)

Paul Devereux is my favorite resource on earth lights. In his Earth Lights Revelation, he explains that earth lights may be conflated with UFOs, but they appear to be internally produced by the earth in several places where they can be regularly observed. They have been reported across much of human history to the point that they obviously exist, but the mechanism is unclear or has multiple sources. Those mechanisms include electrical phenomenon (including a variant akin to ball lightning), burning gases, and metal deposits (acting like a battery).

Because of their unpredictability and association with haunted areas, earth lights exists on the edge of scientific awareness. This is similar to earthquake lights, which have different characteristics that set them apart from general earth/spook lights. EQLs appear as upward floating orbs, glows, curtains, or flashes. While it is possible that EQLs could be associated with faults, EQLs aren’t associated with railroad tracks and ghost stories which are very much a subset of anomalous light stories.

In short, it has been speculated by some researchers that earth lights may be associated with stressed rock along fault lines (3 such places appeared in my list), but they are not usually associated with earthquake events. If these earth lights appear with coincident earthquakes, that correlation would already have been made long ago. There are many more places that have earth/spook light legends that are not associated with fault lines than places that are.

Interestingly, Hough admits in the paper that earthquake lights are a recognized natural phenomenon. This is a substantive admission since the USGS has always downplayed the idea of EQLs. To me, this shows that the scientific community is now recognizing that the research into EQLs is legitimate.

The press release concludes that “maybe the friendly ghosts are illuminating fault zones in the east”. Again, that is far too much of a reach from this paltry data set.

Unsatisfactory conclusion with a glimmer of hope

The conclusion reached by Hough is baffling. She writes:

Although earthquake phenomena cannot explain every ghost story in every region, considering the lore of the Summerville Light, one is left with three plausible explanations: (1) there was no physical basis for the lore, beyond fanciful imaginations among a local population “spooked” by stories, (2) the legends are true, the ghost of a bereaved wife wandered along a stretch of an old trunk line with a lantern, searching for the head of her decapitated husband, or (3) accounts of apparently supernatural phenomena in and around Summerville can be explained by local earthquake activity starting around or before 1959, including small events that were not recognized as earthquakes.

She favors the last one resulting from ignition of water-soluble gases emitted from faults, like radon or methane, that were then ignited by a spark of static electricity or rock movement. She said that the gases trapped in water droplets might also help explain why these tales of ghost lights seem to occur on dark and misty nights. High humidity is not conductive to static sparks, so this makes little sense.

Left out of these possibilities are other obvious explanations for the stories of famous earth lights. These involve a combination of optical and atmospheric effects, local history and perceptions, social interest in the stories, legend tripping, etc. Speculatively linking the Summerville (and Maco) lights with EQLs in this paper feels misleading and overly simplistic, ignoring the influential social aspects at play with ghost legends and haunted places. And, it may be considered explaining one unknown with another.

Finally, there are two exciting bits in this paper: First, a USGS scientist admits that EQLs are worth scientific attention, and second, it favorably presents the option that EQLs may occur in the seismically stressed area of Charleston, so monitoring and collection of reports of lights should be considered. Hough cites the Enomoto paper, which I also referenced in this recent piece, that provides examples of the stronger evidence emerging in support of EQLs. I am all for more research into this area.

But as for the Summerville light being fault-related, this paper poorly supports that hypothesis. Spooky geology must include the wider, social component to be viable.

References

Devereux, Paul. (1990) Earth Lights Revelation.

Gritzner, Charles F. (2019). North Carolina Ghost Lights and Legends.

Hough, S. E. (2025). Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights? Seismol. Res. Lett. XX, 1–7, doi: 10.1785/0220240442. https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/ssa/srl/article-abstract/doi/10.1785/0220240442/651455/Haunted-Summerville-Ghostly-Lights-or-Earthquake (Paywalled)

Kaczmarek, Dale D. (2003) Illuminating the Darkness: The Mystery of Spooklights.

Palmer, Sean B. (undated) Earth Lights: Spooklights and Ghost Lights. http://inamidst.com/lights/earth

#earthLights #earthquakeLights #folklore #ghostLight #HauntedSummerville #legends #seismology #spookLight #spookyScience #Summervillle #SusanHough

https://sharonahill.com/?p=9241

New paper fails to connect Summerville spook light to earthquakes

A new article by seismologist Susan Hough was published this week in Seismological Research Letters that attempts to connect the legend of the Summerville, South Carolina spook light to earthquake lights (EQLs) resulting from the faults around Charleston that caused the great 1886 quake. Since Hough is a seismologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, her words carry credibility. News of her findings have been appearing in the media strongly suggesting that the mystery of the Summerville light is solved by this conclusion. It is not.

Unfortunately, my read of it is that this paper shows that Hough didn’t know much about the wider scale of reports of either earth lights (spook or ghost lights) or earthquake lights (luminous phenomenon associated with seismic events). As part of the release of the paper, Hough says that the idea came to her after reading a Halloween-week USGS newsletter with links to “spooky science” studies and that it sparked an idea she hadn’t thought much about – connecting the ghost stories of Summerville to EQLs.

To make a convincing case, the Summerville story would have to be sufficiently unique to other spook light stories and temporally tied to earthquake lights to suggest this cause. Hough’s paper, Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights?, fails to make that case.

The Summerville spook light

Charleston, SC has a lot of ghost stories. The Summerville light is included in common and widespread lore related to a ghost walking the railroad track with a lantern. Associated strange events near Summerville noted by Hough include car engines stopping, frost appearing on windows, audible whispers or voices, strange fingerprints found later on cars, visible apparitions, and cars that “violently shook”. The latter is considered by Hough to be evidence of small shallow, localized quakes.

The paper goes on to talk about a nearby “haunted house” and weakly ties apparition sightings to hallucinogenic gases released (as with Delphi) along faults. This is an unconvincing stretch – the two locations are not comparable. Gases aren’t causing people to hallucinate ghosts.

The earthquake history of the Charleston/Summerville area is obvious, but it is not possible to correlate seismic activity with sightings of the Summerville light because of the lack of recording of small quakes at this time and the inability to cite all reports of the light. Perhaps this can change, maybe a result of this paper – an exciting possibility.

Hough then moves to the similar story of the Maco light of North Carolina. I cannot follow the connection that can be made to seismic activity and this spook light location. Kaczmarek (2003) noted that the Maco light sightings stopped after the tracks were removed. I’m not sure if this is true but maybe the rails are more of a key to the spook light mystery than faults.

Spook lights not by de-fault

It is a mistake to generally link earth (spook) lights to fault lines. The sheer number of earth light locations worldwide have not correlated well to fault areas. It may be possible that some are, and that the mechanism remains difficult to resolve, but earth lights are their own phenomenon separate from EQLs.

Several years ago, I began a database to collect locations of earth lights. I let the work slide as it became overwhelming; I reached an incomplete list of 214 different locations of anomalous earth lights worldwide. These locations consisted of tales (usually multiple occurrences) of near-ground sightings of luminous phenomena. While some of these are dubious, faked, or one-off events, many of these locations became notable for their spook lights – Marfa, Min Min, Joplin, Brown Mountain. This list is biased toward US locations because of my sources (Kaczmarek, Gritzner and Palmer).

I pulled up the database again to cross-check the details. Though I did not confirm all of their characteristics, 129 of 214 were explicitly called “ghost lights”, “spook lights”, or were directly connected with a ghost legend. (I’m not sure about the rest because I haven’t looked into the details enough, but I would bet that many more have associated ghost tales.) Such phenomenon accrue strong local folklore aspects and are thus reinforced over time.

Out of the 129, 34 were associated directly with railroads. And, 31 were described with a distinctive “swinging lantern” movement that people connected to the action of someone walking along the tracks searching for something. (This may be a natural results of our visual capability in tracking light sources in the dark – UFOs are also said to move back and forth in response to our involuntary eye movements.)

Paul Devereux is my favorite resource on earth lights. In his Earth Lights Revelation, he explains that earth lights may be conflated with UFOs, but they appear to be internally produced by the earth in several places where they can be regularly observed. They have been reported across much of human history to the point that they obviously exist, but the mechanism is unclear or has multiple sources. Those mechanisms include electrical phenomenon (including a variant akin to ball lightning), burning gases, and metal deposits (acting like a battery).

Because of their unpredictability and association with haunted areas, earth lights exists on the edge of scientific awareness. This is similar to earthquake lights, which have different characteristics that set them apart from general earth/spook lights. EQLs appear as upward floating orbs, glows, curtains, or flashes. While it is possible that EQLs could be associated with faults, EQLs aren’t associated with railroad tracks and ghost stories which are very much a subset of anomalous light stories.

In short, it has been speculated by some researchers that earth lights may be associated with stressed rock along fault lines (3 such places appeared in my list), but they are not usually associated with earthquake events. If these earth lights appear with coincident earthquakes, that correlation would already have been made long ago. There are many more places that have earth/spook light legends that are not associated with fault lines than places that are.

Interestingly, Hough admits in the paper that earthquake lights are a recognized natural phenomenon. This is a substantive admission since the USGS has always downplayed the idea of EQLs. To me, this shows that the scientific community is now recognizing that the research into EQLs is legitimate.

The press release concludes that “maybe the friendly ghosts are illuminating fault zones in the east”. Again, that is far too much of a reach from this paltry data set.

Unsatisfactory conclusion with a glimmer of hope

The conclusion reached by Hough is baffling. She writes:

Although earthquake phenomena cannot explain every ghost story in every region, considering the lore of the Summerville Light, one is left with three plausible explanations: (1) there was no physical basis for the lore, beyond fanciful imaginations among a local population “spooked” by stories, (2) the legends are true, the ghost of a bereaved wife wandered along a stretch of an old trunk line with a lantern, searching for the head of her decapitated husband, or (3) accounts of apparently supernatural phenomena in and around Summerville can be explained by local earthquake activity starting around or before 1959, including small events that were not recognized as earthquakes.

She favors the last one resulting from ignition of water-soluble gases emitted from faults, like radon or methane, that were then ignited by a spark of static electricity or rock movement. She said that the gases trapped in water droplets might also help explain why these tales of ghost lights seem to occur on dark and misty nights. High humidity is not conductive to static sparks, so this makes little sense.

Left out of these possibilities are other obvious explanations for the stories of famous earth lights. These involve a combination of optical and atmospheric effects, local history and perceptions, social interest in the stories, legend tripping, etc. Speculatively linking the Summerville (and Maco) lights with EQLs in this paper feels misleading and overly simplistic, ignoring the influential social aspects at play with ghost legends and haunted places. And, it may be considered explaining one unknown with another.

Finally, there are two exciting bits in this paper: First, a USGS scientist admits that EQLs are worth scientific attention, and second, it favorably presents the option that EQLs may occur in the seismically stressed area of Charleston, so monitoring and collection of reports of lights should be considered. Hough cites the Enomoto paper, which I also referenced in this recent piece, that provides examples of the stronger evidence emerging in support of EQLs. I am all for more research into this area.

But as for the Summerville light being fault-related, this paper poorly supports that hypothesis. Spooky geology must include the wider, social component to be viable.

References

Devereux, Paul. (1990) Earth Lights Revelation.

Gritzner, Charles F. (2019). North Carolina Ghost Lights and Legends.

Hough, S. E. (2025). Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights? Seismol. Res. Lett. XX, 1–7, doi: 10.1785/0220240442. https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/ssa/srl/article-abstract/doi/10.1785/0220240442/651455/Haunted-Summerville-Ghostly-Lights-or-Earthquake (Paywalled)

Kaczmarek, Dale D. (2003) Illuminating the Darkness: The Mystery of Spooklights.

Palmer, Sean B. (undated) Earth Lights: Spooklights and Ghost Lights. http://inamidst.com/lights/earth

#earthLights #earthquakeLights #folklore #ghostLight #HauntedSummerville #legends #seismology #spookLight #spookyScience #Summervillle #SusanHough

https://sharonahill.com/?p=9241

New paper fails to connect Summerville spook light to earthquakes

A new article by seismologist Susan Hough was published this week in Seismological Research Letters that attempts to connect the legend of the Summerville, South Carolina spook light to earthquake lights (EQLs) resulting from the faults around Charleston that caused the great 1886 quake. Since Hough is a seismologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, her words carry credibility. News of her findings have been appearing in the media strongly suggesting that the mystery of the Summerville light is solved by this conclusion. It is not.

Unfortunately, my read of it is that this paper shows that Hough didn’t know much about the wider scale of reports of either earth lights (spook or ghost lights) or earthquake lights (luminous phenomenon associated with seismic events). As part of the release of the paper, Hough says that the idea came to her after reading a Halloween-week USGS newsletter with links to “spooky science” studies and that it sparked an idea she hadn’t thought much about – connecting the ghost stories of Summerville to EQLs.

To make a convincing case, the Summerville story would have to be sufficiently unique to other spook light stories and temporally tied to earthquake lights to suggest this cause. Hough’s paper, Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights?, fails to make that case.

The Summerville spook light

Charleston, SC has a lot of ghost stories. The Summerville light is included in common and widespread lore related to a ghost walking the railroad track with a lantern. Associated strange events near Summerville noted by Hough include car engines stopping, frost appearing on windows, audible whispers or voices, strange fingerprints found later on cars, visible apparitions, and cars that “violently shook”. The latter is considered by Hough to be evidence of small shallow, localized quakes.

The paper goes on to talk about a nearby “haunted house” and weakly ties apparition sightings to hallucinogenic gases released (as with Delphi) along faults. This is an unconvincing stretch – the two locations are not comparable. Gases aren’t causing people to hallucinate ghosts.

The earthquake history of the Charleston/Summerville area is obvious, but it is not possible to correlate seismic activity with sightings of the Summerville light because of the lack of recording of small quakes at this time and the inability to cite all reports of the light. Perhaps this can change, maybe a result of this paper – an exciting possibility.

Hough then moves to the similar story of the Maco light of North Carolina. I cannot follow the connection that can be made to seismic activity and this spook light location. Kaczmarek (2003) noted that the Maco light sightings stopped after the tracks were removed. I’m not sure if this is true but maybe the rails are more of a key to the spook light mystery than faults.

Spook lights not by de-fault

It is a mistake to generally link earth (spook) lights to fault lines. The sheer number of earth light locations worldwide have not correlated well to fault areas. It may be possible that some are, and that the mechanism remains difficult to resolve, but earth lights are their own phenomenon separate from EQLs.

Several years ago, I began a database to collect locations of earth lights. I let the work slide as it became overwhelming; I reached an incomplete list of 214 different locations of anomalous earth lights worldwide. These locations consisted of tales (usually multiple occurrences) of near-ground sightings of luminous phenomena. While some of these are dubious, faked, or one-off events, many of these locations became notable for their spook lights – Marfa, Min Min, Joplin, Brown Mountain. This list is biased toward US locations because of my sources (Kaczmarek, Gritzner and Palmer).

I pulled up the database again to cross-check the details. Though I did not confirm all of their characteristics, 129 of 214 were explicitly called “ghost lights”, “spook lights”, or were directly connected with a ghost legend. (I’m not sure about the rest because I haven’t looked into the details enough, but I would bet that many more have associated ghost tales.) Such phenomenon accrue strong local folklore aspects and are thus reinforced over time.

Out of the 129, 34 were associated directly with railroads. And, 31 were described with a distinctive “swinging lantern” movement that people connected to the action of someone walking along the tracks searching for something. (This may be a natural results of our visual capability in tracking light sources in the dark – UFOs are also said to move back and forth in response to our involuntary eye movements.)

Paul Devereux is my favorite resource on earth lights. In his Earth Lights Revelation, he explains that earth lights may be conflated with UFOs, but they appear to be internally produced by the earth in several places where they can be regularly observed. They have been reported across much of human history to the point that they obviously exist, but the mechanism is unclear or has multiple sources. Those mechanisms include electrical phenomenon (including a variant akin to ball lightning), burning gases, and metal deposits (acting like a battery).

Because of their unpredictability and association with haunted areas, earth lights exists on the edge of scientific awareness. This is similar to earthquake lights, which have different characteristics that set them apart from general earth/spook lights. EQLs appear as upward floating orbs, glows, curtains, or flashes. While it is possible that EQLs could be associated with faults, EQLs aren’t associated with railroad tracks and ghost stories which are very much a subset of anomalous light stories.

In short, it has been speculated by some researchers that earth lights may be associated with stressed rock along fault lines (3 such places appeared in my list), but they are not usually associated with earthquake events. If these earth lights appear with coincident earthquakes, that correlation would already have been made long ago. There are many more places that have earth/spook light legends that are not associated with fault lines than places that are.

Interestingly, Hough admits in the paper that earthquake lights are a recognized natural phenomenon. This is a substantive admission since the USGS has always downplayed the idea of EQLs. To me, this shows that the scientific community is now recognizing that the research into EQLs is legitimate.

The press release concludes that “maybe the friendly ghosts are illuminating fault zones in the east”. Again, that is far too much of a reach from this paltry data set.

Unsatisfactory conclusion with a glimmer of hope

The conclusion reached by Hough is baffling. She writes:

Although earthquake phenomena cannot explain every ghost story in every region, considering the lore of the Summerville Light, one is left with three plausible explanations: (1) there was no physical basis for the lore, beyond fanciful imaginations among a local population “spooked” by stories, (2) the legends are true, the ghost of a bereaved wife wandered along a stretch of an old trunk line with a lantern, searching for the head of her decapitated husband, or (3) accounts of apparently supernatural phenomena in and around Summerville can be explained by local earthquake activity starting around or before 1959, including small events that were not recognized as earthquakes.

She favors the last one resulting from ignition of water-soluble gases emitted from faults, like radon or methane, that were then ignited by a spark of static electricity or rock movement. She said that the gases trapped in water droplets might also help explain why these tales of ghost lights seem to occur on dark and misty nights. High humidity is not conductive to static sparks, so this makes little sense.

Left out of these possibilities are other obvious explanations for the stories of famous earth lights. These involve a combination of optical and atmospheric effects, local history and perceptions, social interest in the stories, legend tripping, etc. Speculatively linking the Summerville (and Maco) lights with EQLs in this paper feels misleading and overly simplistic, ignoring the influential social aspects at play with ghost legends and haunted places. And, it may be considered explaining one unknown with another.

Finally, there are two exciting bits in this paper: First, a USGS scientist admits that EQLs are worth scientific attention, and second, it favorably presents the option that EQLs may occur in the seismically stressed area of Charleston, so monitoring and collection of reports of lights should be considered. Hough cites the Enomoto paper, which I also referenced in this recent piece, that provides examples of the stronger evidence emerging in support of EQLs. I am all for more research into this area.

But as for the Summerville light being fault-related, this paper poorly supports that hypothesis. Spooky geology must include the wider, social component to be viable.

References

Devereux, Paul. (1990) Earth Lights Revelation.

Gritzner, Charles F. (2019). North Carolina Ghost Lights and Legends.

Hough, S. E. (2025). Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights? Seismol. Res. Lett. XX, 1–7, doi: 10.1785/0220240442. https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/ssa/srl/article-abstract/doi/10.1785/0220240442/651455/Haunted-Summerville-Ghostly-Lights-or-Earthquake (Paywalled)

Kaczmarek, Dale D. (2003) Illuminating the Darkness: The Mystery of Spooklights.

Palmer, Sean B. (undated) Earth Lights: Spooklights and Ghost Lights. http://inamidst.com/lights/earth

#earthLights #earthquakeLights #folklore #ghostLight #HauntedSummerville #legends #seismology #spookLight #spookyScience #Summervillle #SusanHough

https://sharonahill.com/?p=9241

New paper fails to connect Summerville spook light to earthquakes

A new article by seismologist Susan Hough was published this week in Seismological Research Letters that attempts to connect the legend of the Summerville, South Carolina spook light to earthquake lights (EQLs) resulting from the faults around Charleston that caused the great 1886 quake. Since Hough is a seismologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, her words carry credibility. News of her findings have been appearing in the media strongly suggesting that the mystery of the Summerville light is solved by this conclusion. It is not.

Unfortunately, my read of it is that this paper shows that Hough didn’t know much about the wider scale of reports of either earth lights (spook or ghost lights) or earthquake lights (luminous phenomenon associated with seismic events). As part of the release of the paper, Hough says that the idea came to her after reading a Halloween-week USGS newsletter with links to “spooky science” studies and that it sparked an idea she hadn’t thought much about – connecting the ghost stories of Summerville to EQLs.

To make a convincing case, the Summerville story would have to be sufficiently unique to other spook light stories and temporally tied to earthquake lights to suggest this cause. Hough’s paper, Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights?, fails to make that case.

The Summerville spook light

Charleston, SC has a lot of ghost stories. The Summerville light is included in common and widespread lore related to a ghost walking the railroad track with a lantern. Associated strange events near Summerville noted by Hough include car engines stopping, frost appearing on windows, audible whispers or voices, strange fingerprints found later on cars, visible apparitions, and cars that “violently shook”. The latter is considered by Hough to be evidence of small shallow, localized quakes.

The paper goes on to talk about a nearby “haunted house” and weakly ties apparition sightings to hallucinogenic gases released (as with Delphi) along faults. This is an unconvincing stretch – the two locations are not comparable. Gases aren’t causing people to hallucinate ghosts.

The earthquake history of the Charleston/Summerville area is obvious, but it is not possible to correlate seismic activity with sightings of the Summerville light because of the lack of recording of small quakes at this time and the inability to cite all reports of the light. Perhaps this can change, maybe a result of this paper – an exciting possibility.

Hough then moves to the similar story of the Maco light of North Carolina. I cannot follow the connection that can be made to seismic activity and this spook light location. Kaczmarek (2003) noted that the Maco light sightings stopped after the tracks were removed. I’m not sure if this is true but maybe the rails are more of a key to the spook light mystery than faults.

Spook lights not by de-fault

It is a mistake to generally link earth (spook) lights to fault lines. The sheer number of earth light locations worldwide have not correlated well to fault areas. It may be possible that some are, and that the mechanism remains difficult to resolve, but earth lights are their own phenomenon separate from EQLs.

Several years ago, I began a database to collect locations of earth lights. I let the work slide as it became overwhelming; I reached an incomplete list of 214 different locations of anomalous earth lights worldwide. These locations consisted of tales (usually multiple occurrences) of near-ground sightings of luminous phenomena. While some of these are dubious, faked, or one-off events, many of these locations became notable for their spook lights – Marfa, Min Min, Joplin, Brown Mountain. This list is biased toward US locations because of my sources (Kaczmarek, Gritzner and Palmer).

I pulled up the database again to cross-check the details. Though I did not confirm all of their characteristics, 129 of 214 were explicitly called “ghost lights”, “spook lights”, or were directly connected with a ghost legend. (I’m not sure about the rest because I haven’t looked into the details enough, but I would bet that many more have associated ghost tales.) Such phenomenon accrue strong local folklore aspects and are thus reinforced over time.

Out of the 129, 34 were associated directly with railroads. And, 31 were described with a distinctive “swinging lantern” movement that people connected to the action of someone walking along the tracks searching for something. (This may be a natural results of our visual capability in tracking light sources in the dark – UFOs are also said to move back and forth in response to our involuntary eye movements.)

Paul Devereux is my favorite resource on earth lights. In his Earth Lights Revelation, he explains that earth lights may be conflated with UFOs, but they appear to be internally produced by the earth in several places where they can be regularly observed. They have been reported across much of human history to the point that they obviously exist, but the mechanism is unclear or has multiple sources. Those mechanisms include electrical phenomenon (including a variant akin to ball lightning), burning gases, and metal deposits (acting like a battery).

Because of their unpredictability and association with haunted areas, earth lights exists on the edge of scientific awareness. This is similar to earthquake lights, which have different characteristics that set them apart from general earth/spook lights. EQLs appear as upward floating orbs, glows, curtains, or flashes. While it is possible that EQLs could be associated with faults, EQLs aren’t associated with railroad tracks and ghost stories which are very much a subset of anomalous light stories.

In short, it has been speculated by some researchers that earth lights may be associated with stressed rock along fault lines (3 such places appeared in my list), but they are not usually associated with earthquake events. If these earth lights appear with coincident earthquakes, that correlation would already have been made long ago. There are many more places that have earth/spook light legends that are not associated with fault lines than places that are.

Interestingly, Hough admits in the paper that earthquake lights are a recognized natural phenomenon. This is a substantive admission since the USGS has always downplayed the idea of EQLs. To me, this shows that the scientific community is now recognizing that the research into EQLs is legitimate.

The press release concludes that “maybe the friendly ghosts are illuminating fault zones in the east”. Again, that is far too much of a reach from this paltry data set.

Unsatisfactory conclusion with a glimmer of hope

The conclusion reached by Hough is baffling. She writes:

Although earthquake phenomena cannot explain every ghost story in every region, considering the lore of the Summerville Light, one is left with three plausible explanations: (1) there was no physical basis for the lore, beyond fanciful imaginations among a local population “spooked” by stories, (2) the legends are true, the ghost of a bereaved wife wandered along a stretch of an old trunk line with a lantern, searching for the head of her decapitated husband, or (3) accounts of apparently supernatural phenomena in and around Summerville can be explained by local earthquake activity starting around or before 1959, including small events that were not recognized as earthquakes.

She favors the last one resulting from ignition of water-soluble gases emitted from faults, like radon or methane, that were then ignited by a spark of static electricity or rock movement. She said that the gases trapped in water droplets might also help explain why these tales of ghost lights seem to occur on dark and misty nights. High humidity is not conductive to static sparks, so this makes little sense.

Left out of these possibilities are other obvious explanations for the stories of famous earth lights. These involve a combination of optical and atmospheric effects, local history and perceptions, social interest in the stories, legend tripping, etc. Speculatively linking the Summerville (and Maco) lights with EQLs in this paper feels misleading and overly simplistic, ignoring the influential social aspects at play with ghost legends and haunted places. And, it may be considered explaining one unknown with another.

Finally, there are two exciting bits in this paper: First, a USGS scientist admits that EQLs are worth scientific attention, and second, it favorably presents the option that EQLs may occur in the seismically stressed area of Charleston, so monitoring and collection of reports of lights should be considered. Hough cites the Enomoto paper, which I also referenced in this recent piece, that provides examples of the stronger evidence emerging in support of EQLs. I am all for more research into this area.

But as for the Summerville light being fault-related, this paper poorly supports that hypothesis. Spooky geology must include the wider, social component to be viable.

References

Devereux, Paul. (1990) Earth Lights Revelation.

Gritzner, Charles F. (2019). North Carolina Ghost Lights and Legends.

Hough, S. E. (2025). Haunted Summerville: Ghostly Lights or Earthquake Lights? Seismol. Res. Lett. XX, 1–7, doi: 10.1785/0220240442. https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/ssa/srl/article-abstract/doi/10.1785/0220240442/651455/Haunted-Summerville-Ghostly-Lights-or-Earthquake (Paywalled)

Kaczmarek, Dale D. (2003) Illuminating the Darkness: The Mystery of Spooklights.

Palmer, Sean B. (undated) Earth Lights: Spooklights and Ghost Lights. http://inamidst.com/lights/earth

#earthLights #earthquakeLights #folklore #ghostLight #HauntedSummerville #legends #seismology #spookLight #spookyScience #Summervillle #SusanHough

https://sharonahill.com/?p=9241

Earthquake Lights Revisited – More Evidence Emerging

One of the most productive topics under my umbrella of Spooky Geology has been that of Earthquake Lights (EQLs). I began researching the best evidence for strange and doubtful earthquake precursors in 2006 and have followed the subject since then. In 2018, I produced my major writeup of relevant facts and opinions on the matter and have commented on EQLs in popular culture in additional pieces.

Capturing evidence is difficult

Five more recent journal papers (from 2019 to 2024) on the topic show that there is progress being made in examining EQLs with interesting results. Most of the evidence still remains anecdotal, which is the worst kind of scientific evidence, but the new research documents additional data that will undoubtedly change the way we think of earthquakes as part of an Earth system.

We are in the age of digital technology, with ubiquitous personal recording devices. Not only are people recording around them during quakes but outward facing devices are continually surveilling the outdoors. We should see more evidence of anomalies captured. Mostly, what has been recorded are the blue-white flashes that take place during the quakes, which I’ve discussed in several previous posts. There have also been images of rainbow clouds, glowing sky, and balls of light that may be associated with the event. Still, the results are not great and the concept remains questionable to seismologists.

As I described in previous pieces, it’s difficult to capture changes in the pre-quake environment. Earthquakes happen all over the world and in indeterminate time frames. To set up observations for EQLs and associated precursors, the scale and scope are huge. There are multiple variables that would need to be measured, and coverage in time and space must be adequate. Even in areas of known seismic activity, this will be very expensive and may not get the intended results.

There had always been inadvertent data collection that raised showed anomalies and raised questions. It is well-known that, in some areas, radon levels elevate in response to the time where the fault is “preparing” to let loose, when the rock is undergoing microfracturing. However, not all faults will produce the same, or any, precursors – each seismic event is unique, even on the same fault. Traditional research in seismology has focused on mechanical observations like ground deformation and prior events. Are seismologists looking in the wrong place? A relatively new concept of a interactive electrical earth system suggests this may be so.

Watching the ionosphere

The five articles I examined (in the References below) discuss the connection between seismic activity and the ionosphere. While it seems strange to find evidence for earthquake activity in the upper reaches of the atmosphere (where the aurora displays), in the last few decades, evidence is mounting for the lithospheric-atmospheric-ionospheric coupling model or LAIC. This model assumes that processes which happen when rock in the earth’s crust is stressed create electrical signals exhibited in the atmosphere. The seismo-electromagnetic phenomenon may be show up as anomalous electrical signals, magnetic field changes, ground temperature variations, atmospheric changes, and luminous phenomenon such as EQLs.

In the crustal lithosphere – the location of the earth’s tectonic plates – pressure during the lead up to fault slip causes microfracturing in the rock. Radon and other gases are released and migrate through fractures and the fault area. Electric currents may also be generated. Different models of how this might work are proposed. Some researches focus on the freed (radioactive) radon that generates ionized air (positive and negative ions). Others propose that negative charges in the fracturing rock induce positive charges to collect at ground level. Localized ionization can increase water vapor condensation and variation in conductivity, and may potentially explain pre-earthquake anomalies such as “earthquake weather”, odd animal and plant behavior, electromagnetic anomalies, glowing ground, strange clouds, etc. Because the atmosphere is dynamic, the effects may rapidly appear or disappear. In the electromagnetic fault model, the ground and the atmosphere interact to produce EQLs of various types or odd clouds.

No layer of the Earth exists in isolation. It is not unreasonable to assume that a large energy event such as a major earthquake would show signals revealed in our earth system. The interactive model of effects contend that the electrical effects propagate into the atmosphere to the ionosphere where they are best observed via satellite. The French satellite DEMETER (Detection of Electro-Magnetic Emissions Transmitted from EQ Regions) operated between 2004 and 2010 specifically to detect electromagnetic phenomena related to quakes and volcanic eruptions. The DEMETER observed significant disturbances in the ionosphere 5 days before the Wenchuan/Sichuan, China earthquake of 2008. The deviation in ion density was observed within 200km of the epicenter. Chinese scientists established a monitoring station in the Sichuan province called MVP-LAI to assess the complex interactions for the future.

I must stress that the relationship between ionospheric anomalies and earthquakes is highly debated. Some previous studies were weak and are refuted. There is difficulty in using satellite observations. Geomagnetic disturbances and meteorological events will interfere with any effects coming from a quake. The proposal that these signals might be used as a warning of a coming quake days or even months ahead creates serious problems with prediction and social ramifications. They remain unreliable, but the ideas are very intriguing and the data is accumulating.

Examples

For various examples of EQLs and anomalies, see my previous article that details the observances in Saguenay, Canada (1988), Matsushiro, Japan (1968) and several other examples include the rainbow cloud from Sichuan 2008. More about this phenomenon has come to light since then.

Sichuan/Wenchuan 12 May 2008
In addition to the DEMETER data, this quake is associated with the infamous “rainbow cloud” that was seen and photographed within several hundred km from the epicenter 10-60 minutes before the quake. Enomoto (2024) concludes this was not the common optical phenomenon known as a circumhorizon arc because it was not localized and was not at the correct angle of the sun. He suggests that it was a different type of light dispersion related to an atmospheric electrical anomaly. The total electron content (TEC) in the atmosphere was noted to increase above the epicenter 37 minutes prior.

Fukushima-oki Japan, 13 February 2021
Multiple parameters were observed by researchers, but the most convincing, according to authors Hayakawa and Hobara (2024), were the ultra and extremely low frequency (ULF/ELF) radio waves that they observed about 1 week prior to the quake, up to the day of the quake. See more below on the second Fukushima event in 2022 that produced flashes.

Kobe, Japan 1995
Luminous clouds were observed an hour before and 27 minutes after this quake accompanied by pulsed radio emissions. The clouds were described “like a fire breathing dragon” by a photographer. The quake area also was host to an unusual spiral cloud eight days prior. A fisherman reported to Enomoto that he observed electric sparks at ground level. Later, Enomoto discovered that a portion of ground area along the fault had been blackened and the grass charred. After analyzing the fault gouge material, and conducting experiments, he concluded that the clay minerals in the fault zone had been subject to a significant current discharge, altering the material that was not found elsewhere. This was published in a separate paper with others in 2001 (noted in my previous post). The Kobe area has a belt of granite that hosts numerous radon springs. Enomoto suggests that released water vapor can carry radon or methane upwards out of the fault area into the atmosphere.

Japan’s historical quakes
Enomoto’s 2024 study looked at a historical list of 872 quakes in Japan and found that 9% of damaging quakes had some mention of EQLs. He took a closer look at 21 of these quakes, including the Kobe even, concluding that the interaction of earth layers are the probable cause of the anomalies, and that it might be possible to predict quakes based on this signals. Some of the other examples mentioned in the historical records include soundless lightning or flashes on a sunny day in various quakes whereby he surmises that an electrical anomaly different than lightning was occurring. Additionally, there were reports of more intense lightning strikes during bad weather associated with quakes. Methane may be implicated in some manifestation of EQLs as the gas could be ignited by frictional heat or static electricity as its emitted from the ground. Methane hydrate eruptions triggered by underwater landslides could appear as glowing seas and pillars of fire off the coast. Reports of these phenomena differ from luminescence produced by phosphorescent organisms.

The Enomoto paper is readable and contains helpful illustrations and diagrams. I recommend checking it out. I would like to share more of the interesting examples in that paper but this post is extensive enough.

Flashes

I have detailed in other posts tagged as “earthquake lights” the obvious misidentification of flashes during a quake. There are definitely flashes that are attributable to transformer explosions and electric arcing from downed wires. Here is an example of that happening during shaking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q65aE8JiPL0

Previously, I held the opinion that all such blue-white flashes filmed at night during quakes were attributable to the electricity distribution network, even though they are now frequently called EQLs by the media. That view has been shaken a bit by the paper by Xie, et al. (2023) related to the Fukushima earthquake of 16 March 2022. During the shaking, a flash burst out from the surface at the Sendai city and airport area. This was captured on two different cameras with one camera capturing two flashes close to each other while the second camera was interrupted so only one was caught. Using the overlap zone of two cameras, the position of the flash area was estimated. Here is the zinger that caught my attention:

“[W]e also collected maintenance reports on electrical facilities after the shock to rule out the possibility of the flashes being caused by explosions in transformers or power supply facilities. The reports on the locations of the malfunctioning power stations showed that some of the power stations along Sendai’s eastern coast did malfunction, but they were far away from where the EQLs appeared in the inland region”.

The authors conclude that the flash was caused by electrical current from the rock and a horizontal magnetic field disturbance. It does not appear to be related to the electricity distribution network.

Here is a video showing various instances of lights seen in the sky during the quake:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8Ma0nkCqis

This is certainly not definitive to say that flashes seen during quakes are EQLs, but it opens the potential that some are. It could be that the blue-white flashes of wires and transformers may produce a similar visual effect as the much rarer EQLs. There is a problem with confirming this conclusion as one would have to be able to document all flashes and match these with utility failures in order to discard those causes. It would be ideal if cameras could capture a flash in a precise location up close to confirm a natural cause. That has not yet happened.

In conclusion, the continuing research into the LAIC and electro-seismic models, notably in China and Japan, is exciting. They consider that observations of atmospheric anomalies are genuine and explainable, not discounted as mistakes or exaggerations. There is an inherent unreliability in eyewitness reports. But, I do think that the difference in tectonic regimes between the US and Asia can result in dismissal of the historical evidence about atmospheric earthquake anomalies. We simply don’t have the same range of seismic incidents, in large cities, that occur in those places. In the not so distant future, we may see greater acceptance of strange reports associated with earthquakes taken seriously as the weight of the evidence and a reasonable mechanism to explain them has won over the scientific community. It looks like serious investigation into the potential explanations for EQLs will continue.

References

Chen, H.; Han, P.; Hattori, K. Recent Advances and Challenges in the Seismo-Electromagnetic Study: A Brief Review. Remote Sens. 2022, 14, 5893. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14225893

De Santis A, Abbattista C, Alfonsi L, Amoruso L, Campuzano SA, Carbone M, Cesaroni C, Cianchini G, De Franceschi G, De Santis A, Di Giovambattista R, Marchetti D, Martino L, Perrone L, Piscini A, Rainone ML, Soldani M, Spogli L, Santoro F. Geosystemics View of Earthquakes. Entropy (Basel). 2019 Apr 18;21(4):412. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7514901/

Enomoto, Y. Earthquake Lights Observed in Japan—Possible Underlying Mechanisms. Atmosphere 2024, 15, 916. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15080916

Hayakawa, M.; Hobara, Y. Integrated Analysis of Multi- Parameter Precursors to the Fukushima Offshore Earthquake (Mj = 7.3) on 13 February 2021 and Lithosphere–Atmosphere– Ionosphere Coupling Channels. Atmosphere 2024, 15, 1015. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15081015

Xie, B.; Wu, L.; Mao, W.; Wang, Z.; Sun, L.; Xu, Y. Horizontal Magnetic Anomaly Accompanying the Co-Seismic Earthquake Light of the M7.3 Fukushima Earthquake of 16 March 2022: Phenomenon and Mechanism. Remote Sens. 2023, 15, 5052. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs15205052

#Anomalies #earthquakeLights #earthquakePrecursors #EQL #ionosphere #LAIC #luminousPhenomena #mysteriousLights #rainbowCloud #skyFlashes #SpookyGeology

https://sharonahill.com/?p=8803

Earthquake Lights Revisited – More Evidence Emerging

One of the most productive topics under my umbrella of Spooky Geology has been that of Earthquake Lights (EQLs). I began researching the best evidence for strange and doubtful earthquake precursors in 2006 and have followed the subject since then. In 2018, I produced my major writeup of relevant facts and opinions on the matter and have commented on EQLs in popular culture in additional pieces.

Capturing evidence is difficult

Five more recent journal papers (from 2019 to 2024) on the topic show that there is progress being made in examining EQLs with interesting results. Most of the evidence still remains anecdotal, which is the worst kind of scientific evidence, but the new research documents additional data that will undoubtedly change the way we think of earthquakes as part of an Earth system.

We are in the age of digital technology, with ubiquitous personal recording devices. Not only are people recording around them during quakes but outward facing devices are continually surveilling the outdoors. We should see more evidence of anomalies captured. Mostly, what has been recorded are the blue-white flashes that take place during the quakes, which I’ve discussed in several previous posts. There have also been images of rainbow clouds, glowing sky, and balls of light that may be associated with the event. Still, the results are not great and the concept remains questionable to seismologists.

As I described in previous pieces, it’s difficult to capture changes in the pre-quake environment. Earthquakes happen all over the world and in indeterminate time frames. To set up observations for EQLs and associated precursors, the scale and scope are huge. There are multiple variables that would need to be measured, and coverage in time and space must be adequate. Even in areas of known seismic activity, this will be very expensive and may not get the intended results.

There had always been inadvertent data collection that raised showed anomalies and raised questions. It is well-known that, in some areas, radon levels elevate in response to the time where the fault is “preparing” to let loose, when the rock is undergoing microfracturing. However, not all faults will produce the same, or any, precursors – each seismic event is unique, even on the same fault. Traditional research in seismology has focused on mechanical observations like ground deformation and prior events. Are seismologists looking in the wrong place? A relatively new concept of a interactive electrical earth system suggests this may be so.

Watching the ionosphere

The five articles I examined (in the References below) discuss the connection between seismic activity and the ionosphere. While it seems strange to find evidence for earthquake activity in the upper reaches of the atmosphere (where the aurora displays), in the last few decades, evidence is mounting for the lithospheric-atmospheric-ionospheric coupling model or LAIC. This model assumes that processes which happen when rock in the earth’s crust is stressed create electrical signals exhibited in the atmosphere. The seismo-electromagnetic phenomenon may be show up as anomalous electrical signals, magnetic field changes, ground temperature variations, atmospheric changes, and luminous phenomenon such as EQLs.

In the crustal lithosphere – the location of the earth’s tectonic plates – pressure during the lead up to fault slip causes microfracturing in the rock. Radon and other gases are released and migrate through fractures and the fault area. Electric currents may also be generated. Different models of how this might work are proposed. Some researches focus on the freed (radioactive) radon that generates ionized air (positive and negative ions). Others propose that negative charges in the fracturing rock induce positive charges to collect at ground level. Localized ionization can increase water vapor condensation and variation in conductivity, and may potentially explain pre-earthquake anomalies such as “earthquake weather”, odd animal and plant behavior, electromagnetic anomalies, glowing ground, strange clouds, etc. Because the atmosphere is dynamic, the effects may rapidly appear or disappear. In the electromagnetic fault model, the ground and the atmosphere interact to produce EQLs of various types or odd clouds.

No layer of the Earth exists in isolation. It is not unreasonable to assume that a large energy event such as a major earthquake would show signals revealed in our earth system. The interactive model of effects contend that the electrical effects propagate into the atmosphere to the ionosphere where they are best observed via satellite. The French satellite DEMETER (Detection of Electro-Magnetic Emissions Transmitted from EQ Regions) operated between 2004 and 2010 specifically to detect electromagnetic phenomena related to quakes and volcanic eruptions. The DEMETER observed significant disturbances in the ionosphere 5 days before the Wenchuan/Sichuan, China earthquake of 2008. The deviation in ion density was observed within 200km of the epicenter. Chinese scientists established a monitoring station in the Sichuan province called MVP-LAI to assess the complex interactions for the future.

I must stress that the relationship between ionospheric anomalies and earthquakes is highly debated. Some previous studies were weak and are refuted. There is difficulty in using satellite observations. Geomagnetic disturbances and meteorological events will interfere with any effects coming from a quake. The proposal that these signals might be used as a warning of a coming quake days or even months ahead creates serious problems with prediction and social ramifications. They remain unreliable, but the ideas are very intriguing and the data is accumulating.

Examples

For various examples of EQLs and anomalies, see my previous article that details the observances in Saguenay, Canada (1988), Matsushiro, Japan (1968) and several other examples include the rainbow cloud from Sichuan 2008. More about this phenomenon has come to light since then.

Sichuan/Wenchuan 12 May 2008
In addition to the DEMETER data, this quake is associated with the infamous “rainbow cloud” that was seen and photographed within several hundred km from the epicenter 10-60 minutes before the quake. Enomoto (2024) concludes this was not the common optical phenomenon known as a circumhorizon arc because it was not localized and was not at the correct angle of the sun. He suggests that it was a different type of light dispersion related to an atmospheric electrical anomaly. The total electron content (TEC) in the atmosphere was noted to increase above the epicenter 37 minutes prior.

Fukushima-oki Japan, 13 February 2021
Multiple parameters were observed by researchers, but the most convincing, according to authors Hayakawa and Hobara (2024), were the ultra and extremely low frequency (ULF/ELF) radio waves that they observed about 1 week prior to the quake, up to the day of the quake. See more below on the second Fukushima event in 2022 that produced flashes.

Kobe, Japan 1995
Luminous clouds were observed an hour before and 27 minutes after this quake accompanied by pulsed radio emissions. The clouds were described “like a fire breathing dragon” by a photographer. The quake area also was host to an unusual spiral cloud eight days prior. A fisherman reported to Enomoto that he observed electric sparks at ground level. Later, Enomoto discovered that a portion of ground area along the fault had been blackened and the grass charred. After analyzing the fault gouge material, and conducting experiments, he concluded that the clay minerals in the fault zone had been subject to a significant current discharge, altering the material that was not found elsewhere. This was published in a separate paper with others in 2001 (noted in my previous post). The Kobe area has a belt of granite that hosts numerous radon springs. Enomoto suggests that released water vapor can carry radon or methane upwards out of the fault area into the atmosphere.

Japan’s historical quakes
Enomoto’s 2024 study looked at a historical list of 872 quakes in Japan and found that 9% of damaging quakes had some mention of EQLs. He took a closer look at 21 of these quakes, including the Kobe even, concluding that the interaction of earth layers are the probable cause of the anomalies, and that it might be possible to predict quakes based on this signals. Some of the other examples mentioned in the historical records include soundless lightning or flashes on a sunny day in various quakes whereby he surmises that an electrical anomaly different than lightning was occurring. Additionally, there were reports of more intense lightning strikes during bad weather associated with quakes. Methane may be implicated in some manifestation of EQLs as the gas could be ignited by frictional heat or static electricity as its emitted from the ground. Methane hydrate eruptions triggered by underwater landslides could appear as glowing seas and pillars of fire off the coast. Reports of these phenomena differ from luminescence produced by phosphorescent organisms.

The Enomoto paper is readable and contains helpful illustrations and diagrams. I recommend checking it out. I would like to share more of the interesting examples in that paper but this post is extensive enough.

Flashes

I have detailed in other posts tagged as “earthquake lights” the obvious misidentification of flashes during a quake. There are definitely flashes that are attributable to transformer explosions and electric arcing from downed wires. Here is an example of that happening during shaking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q65aE8JiPL0

Previously, I held the opinion that all such blue-white flashes filmed at night during quakes were attributable to the electricity distribution network, even though they are now frequently called EQLs by the media. That view has been shaken a bit by the paper by Xie, et al. (2023) related to the Fukushima earthquake of 16 March 2022. During the shaking, a flash burst out from the surface at the Sendai city and airport area. This was captured on two different cameras with one camera capturing two flashes close to each other while the second camera was interrupted so only one was caught. Using the overlap zone of two cameras, the position of the flash area was estimated. Here is the zinger that caught my attention:

“[W]e also collected maintenance reports on electrical facilities after the shock to rule out the possibility of the flashes being caused by explosions in transformers or power supply facilities. The reports on the locations of the malfunctioning power stations showed that some of the power stations along Sendai’s eastern coast did malfunction, but they were far away from where the EQLs appeared in the inland region”.

The authors conclude that the flash was caused by electrical current from the rock and a horizontal magnetic field disturbance. It does not appear to be related to the electricity distribution network.

Here is a video showing various instances of lights seen in the sky during the quake:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8Ma0nkCqis

This is certainly not definitive to say that flashes seen during quakes are EQLs, but it opens the potential that some are. It could be that the blue-white flashes of wires and transformers may produce a similar visual effect as the much rarer EQLs. There is a problem with confirming this conclusion as one would have to be able to document all flashes and match these with utility failures in order to discard those causes. It would be ideal if cameras could capture a flash in a precise location up close to confirm a natural cause. That has not yet happened.

In conclusion, the continuing research into the LAIC and electro-seismic models, notably in China and Japan, is exciting. They consider that observations of atmospheric anomalies are genuine and explainable, not discounted as mistakes or exaggerations. There is an inherent unreliability in eyewitness reports. But, I do think that the difference in tectonic regimes between the US and Asia can result in dismissal of the historical evidence about atmospheric earthquake anomalies. We simply don’t have the same range of seismic incidents, in large cities, that occur in those places. In the not so distant future, we may see greater acceptance of strange reports associated with earthquakes taken seriously as the weight of the evidence and a reasonable mechanism to explain them has won over the scientific community. It looks like serious investigation into the potential explanations for EQLs will continue.

References

Chen, H.; Han, P.; Hattori, K. Recent Advances and Challenges in the Seismo-Electromagnetic Study: A Brief Review. Remote Sens. 2022, 14, 5893. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14225893

De Santis A, Abbattista C, Alfonsi L, Amoruso L, Campuzano SA, Carbone M, Cesaroni C, Cianchini G, De Franceschi G, De Santis A, Di Giovambattista R, Marchetti D, Martino L, Perrone L, Piscini A, Rainone ML, Soldani M, Spogli L, Santoro F. Geosystemics View of Earthquakes. Entropy (Basel). 2019 Apr 18;21(4):412. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7514901/

Enomoto, Y. Earthquake Lights Observed in Japan—Possible Underlying Mechanisms. Atmosphere 2024, 15, 916. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15080916

Hayakawa, M.; Hobara, Y. Integrated Analysis of Multi- Parameter Precursors to the Fukushima Offshore Earthquake (Mj = 7.3) on 13 February 2021 and Lithosphere–Atmosphere– Ionosphere Coupling Channels. Atmosphere 2024, 15, 1015. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15081015

Xie, B.; Wu, L.; Mao, W.; Wang, Z.; Sun, L.; Xu, Y. Horizontal Magnetic Anomaly Accompanying the Co-Seismic Earthquake Light of the M7.3 Fukushima Earthquake of 16 March 2022: Phenomenon and Mechanism. Remote Sens. 2023, 15, 5052. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs15205052

#Anomalies #earthquakeLights #earthquakePrecursors #EQL #ionosphere #LAIC #luminousPhenomena #mysteriousLights #rainbowCloud #skyFlashes #SpookyGeology

https://sharonahill.com/?p=8803

Earthquake Lights Revisited – More Evidence Emerging

One of the most productive topics under my umbrella of Spooky Geology has been that of Earthquake Lights (EQLs). I began researching the best evidence for strange and doubtful earthquake precursors in 2006 and have followed the subject since then. In 2018, I produced my major writeup of relevant facts and opinions on the matter and have commented on EQLs in popular culture in additional pieces.

Capturing evidence is difficult

Five more recent journal papers (from 2019 to 2024) on the topic show that there is progress being made in examining EQLs with interesting results. Most of the evidence still remains anecdotal, which is the worst kind of scientific evidence, but the new research documents additional data that will undoubtedly change the way we think of earthquakes as part of an Earth system.

We are in the age of digital technology, with ubiquitous personal recording devices. Not only are people recording around them during quakes but outward facing devices are continually surveilling the outdoors. We should see more evidence of anomalies captured. Mostly, what has been recorded are the blue-white flashes that take place during the quakes, which I’ve discussed in several previous posts. There have also been images of rainbow clouds, glowing sky, and balls of light that may be associated with the event. Still, the results are not great and the concept remains questionable to seismologists.

As I described in previous pieces, it’s difficult to capture changes in the pre-quake environment. Earthquakes happen all over the world and in indeterminate time frames. To set up observations for EQLs and associated precursors, the scale and scope are huge. There are multiple variables that would need to be measured, and coverage in time and space must be adequate. Even in areas of known seismic activity, this will be very expensive and may not get the intended results.

There had always been inadvertent data collection that raised showed anomalies and raised questions. It is well-known that, in some areas, radon levels elevate in response to the time where the fault is “preparing” to let loose, when the rock is undergoing microfracturing. However, not all faults will produce the same, or any, precursors – each seismic event is unique, even on the same fault. Traditional research in seismology has focused on mechanical observations like ground deformation and prior events. Are seismologists looking in the wrong place? A relatively new concept of a interactive electrical earth system suggests this may be so.

Watching the ionosphere

The five articles I examined (in the References below) discuss the connection between seismic activity and the ionosphere. While it seems strange to find evidence for earthquake activity in the upper reaches of the atmosphere (where the aurora displays), in the last few decades, evidence is mounting for the lithospheric-atmospheric-ionospheric coupling model or LAIC. This model assumes that processes which happen when rock in the earth’s crust is stressed create electrical signals exhibited in the atmosphere. The seismo-electromagnetic phenomenon may be show up as anomalous electrical signals, magnetic field changes, ground temperature variations, atmospheric changes, and luminous phenomenon such as EQLs.

In the crustal lithosphere – the location of the earth’s tectonic plates – pressure during the lead up to fault slip causes microfracturing in the rock. Radon and other gases are released and migrate through fractures and the fault area. Electric currents may also be generated. Different models of how this might work are proposed. Some researches focus on the freed (radioactive) radon that generates ionized air (positive and negative ions). Others propose that negative charges in the fracturing rock induce positive charges to collect at ground level. Localized ionization can increase water vapor condensation and variation in conductivity, and may potentially explain pre-earthquake anomalies such as “earthquake weather”, odd animal and plant behavior, electromagnetic anomalies, glowing ground, strange clouds, etc. Because the atmosphere is dynamic, the effects may rapidly appear or disappear. In the electromagnetic fault model, the ground and the atmosphere interact to produce EQLs of various types or odd clouds.

No layer of the Earth exists in isolation. It is not unreasonable to assume that a large energy event such as a major earthquake would show signals revealed in our earth system. The interactive model of effects contend that the electrical effects propagate into the atmosphere to the ionosphere where they are best observed via satellite. The French satellite DEMETER (Detection of Electro-Magnetic Emissions Transmitted from EQ Regions) operated between 2004 and 2010 specifically to detect electromagnetic phenomena related to quakes and volcanic eruptions. The DEMETER observed significant disturbances in the ionosphere 5 days before the Wenchuan/Sichuan, China earthquake of 2008. The deviation in ion density was observed within 200km of the epicenter. Chinese scientists established a monitoring station in the Sichuan province called MVP-LAI to assess the complex interactions for the future.

I must stress that the relationship between ionospheric anomalies and earthquakes is highly debated. Some previous studies were weak and are refuted. There is difficulty in using satellite observations. Geomagnetic disturbances and meteorological events will interfere with any effects coming from a quake. The proposal that these signals might be used as a warning of a coming quake days or even months ahead creates serious problems with prediction and social ramifications. They remain unreliable, but the ideas are very intriguing and the data is accumulating.

Examples

For various examples of EQLs and anomalies, see my previous article that details the observances in Saguenay, Canada (1988), Matsushiro, Japan (1968) and several other examples include the rainbow cloud from Sichuan 2008. More about this phenomenon has come to light since then.

Sichuan/Wenchuan 12 May 2008
In addition to the DEMETER data, this quake is associated with the infamous “rainbow cloud” that was seen and photographed within several hundred km from the epicenter 10-60 minutes before the quake. Enomoto (2024) concludes this was not the common optical phenomenon known as a circumhorizon arc because it was not localized and was not at the correct angle of the sun. He suggests that it was a different type of light dispersion related to an atmospheric electrical anomaly. The total electron content (TEC) in the atmosphere was noted to increase above the epicenter 37 minutes prior.

Fukushima-oki Japan, 13 February 2021
Multiple parameters were observed by researchers, but the most convincing, according to authors Hayakawa and Hobara (2024), were the ultra and extremely low frequency (ULF/ELF) radio waves that they observed about 1 week prior to the quake, up to the day of the quake. See more below on the second Fukushima event in 2022 that produced flashes.

Kobe, Japan 1995
Luminous clouds were observed an hour before and 27 minutes after this quake accompanied by pulsed radio emissions. The clouds were described “like a fire breathing dragon” by a photographer. The quake area also was host to an unusual spiral cloud eight days prior. A fisherman reported to Enomoto that he observed electric sparks at ground level. Later, Enomoto discovered that a portion of ground area along the fault had been blackened and the grass charred. After analyzing the fault gouge material, and conducting experiments, he concluded that the clay minerals in the fault zone had been subject to a significant current discharge, altering the material that was not found elsewhere. This was published in a separate paper with others in 2001 (noted in my previous post). The Kobe area has a belt of granite that hosts numerous radon springs. Enomoto suggests that released water vapor can carry radon or methane upwards out of the fault area into the atmosphere.

Japan’s historical quakes
Enomoto’s 2024 study looked at a historical list of 872 quakes in Japan and found that 9% of damaging quakes had some mention of EQLs. He took a closer look at 21 of these quakes, including the Kobe even, concluding that the interaction of earth layers are the probable cause of the anomalies, and that it might be possible to predict quakes based on this signals. Some of the other examples mentioned in the historical records include soundless lightning or flashes on a sunny day in various quakes whereby he surmises that an electrical anomaly different than lightning was occurring. Additionally, there were reports of more intense lightning strikes during bad weather associated with quakes. Methane may be implicated in some manifestation of EQLs as the gas could be ignited by frictional heat or static electricity as its emitted from the ground. Methane hydrate eruptions triggered by underwater landslides could appear as glowing seas and pillars of fire off the coast. Reports of these phenomena differ from luminescence produced by phosphorescent organisms.

The Enomoto paper is readable and contains helpful illustrations and diagrams. I recommend checking it out. I would like to share more of the interesting examples in that paper but this post is extensive enough.

Flashes

I have detailed in other posts tagged as “earthquake lights” the obvious misidentification of flashes during a quake. There are definitely flashes that are attributable to transformer explosions and electric arcing from downed wires. Here is an example of that happening during shaking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q65aE8JiPL0

Previously, I held the opinion that all such blue-white flashes filmed at night during quakes were attributable to the electricity distribution network, even though they are now frequently called EQLs by the media. That view has been shaken a bit by the paper by Xie, et al. (2023) related to the Fukushima earthquake of 16 March 2022. During the shaking, a flash burst out from the surface at the Sendai city and airport area. This was captured on two different cameras with one camera capturing two flashes close to each other while the second camera was interrupted so only one was caught. Using the overlap zone of two cameras, the position of the flash area was estimated. Here is the zinger that caught my attention:

“[W]e also collected maintenance reports on electrical facilities after the shock to rule out the possibility of the flashes being caused by explosions in transformers or power supply facilities. The reports on the locations of the malfunctioning power stations showed that some of the power stations along Sendai’s eastern coast did malfunction, but they were far away from where the EQLs appeared in the inland region”.

The authors conclude that the flash was caused by electrical current from the rock and a horizontal magnetic field disturbance. It does not appear to be related to the electricity distribution network.

Here is a video showing various instances of lights seen in the sky during the quake:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8Ma0nkCqis

This is certainly not definitive to say that flashes seen during quakes are EQLs, but it opens the potential that some are. It could be that the blue-white flashes of wires and transformers may produce a similar visual effect as the much rarer EQLs. There is a problem with confirming this conclusion as one would have to be able to document all flashes and match these with utility failures in order to discard those causes. It would be ideal if cameras could capture a flash in a precise location up close to confirm a natural cause. That has not yet happened.

In conclusion, the continuing research into the LAIC and electro-seismic models, notably in China and Japan, is exciting. They consider that observations of atmospheric anomalies are genuine and explainable, not discounted as mistakes or exaggerations. There is an inherent unreliability in eyewitness reports. But, I do think that the difference in tectonic regimes between the US and Asia can result in dismissal of the historical evidence about atmospheric earthquake anomalies. We simply don’t have the same range of seismic incidents, in large cities, that occur in those places. In the not so distant future, we may see greater acceptance of strange reports associated with earthquakes taken seriously as the weight of the evidence and a reasonable mechanism to explain them has won over the scientific community. It looks like serious investigation into the potential explanations for EQLs will continue.

References

Chen, H.; Han, P.; Hattori, K. Recent Advances and Challenges in the Seismo-Electromagnetic Study: A Brief Review. Remote Sens. 2022, 14, 5893. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14225893

De Santis A, Abbattista C, Alfonsi L, Amoruso L, Campuzano SA, Carbone M, Cesaroni C, Cianchini G, De Franceschi G, De Santis A, Di Giovambattista R, Marchetti D, Martino L, Perrone L, Piscini A, Rainone ML, Soldani M, Spogli L, Santoro F. Geosystemics View of Earthquakes. Entropy (Basel). 2019 Apr 18;21(4):412. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7514901/

Enomoto, Y. Earthquake Lights Observed in Japan—Possible Underlying Mechanisms. Atmosphere 2024, 15, 916. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15080916

Hayakawa, M.; Hobara, Y. Integrated Analysis of Multi- Parameter Precursors to the Fukushima Offshore Earthquake (Mj = 7.3) on 13 February 2021 and Lithosphere–Atmosphere– Ionosphere Coupling Channels. Atmosphere 2024, 15, 1015. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15081015

Xie, B.; Wu, L.; Mao, W.; Wang, Z.; Sun, L.; Xu, Y. Horizontal Magnetic Anomaly Accompanying the Co-Seismic Earthquake Light of the M7.3 Fukushima Earthquake of 16 March 2022: Phenomenon and Mechanism. Remote Sens. 2023, 15, 5052. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs15205052

#Anomalies #earthquakeLights #earthquakePrecursors #EQL #ionosphere #LAIC #luminousPhenomena #mysteriousLights #rainbowCloud #skyFlashes #SpookyGeology

https://sharonahill.com/?p=8803

Earthquake Lights Revisited – More Evidence Emerging

One of the most productive topics under my umbrella of Spooky Geology has been that of Earthquake Lights (EQLs). I began researching the best evidence for strange and doubtful earthquake precursors in 2006 and have followed the subject since then. In 2018, I produced my major writeup of relevant facts and opinions on the matter and have commented on EQLs in popular culture in additional pieces.

Capturing evidence is difficult

Five more recent journal papers (from 2019 to 2024) on the topic show that there is progress being made in examining EQLs with interesting results. Most of the evidence still remains anecdotal, which is the worst kind of scientific evidence, but the new research documents additional data that will undoubtedly change the way we think of earthquakes as part of an Earth system.

We are in the age of digital technology, with ubiquitous personal recording devices. Not only are people recording around them during quakes but outward facing devices are continually surveilling the outdoors. We should see more evidence of anomalies captured. Mostly, what has been recorded are the blue-white flashes that take place during the quakes, which I’ve discussed in several previous posts. There have also been images of rainbow clouds, glowing sky, and balls of light that may be associated with the event. Still, the results are not great and the concept remains questionable to seismologists.

As I described in previous pieces, it’s difficult to capture changes in the pre-quake environment. Earthquakes happen all over the world and in indeterminate time frames. To set up observations for EQLs and associated precursors, the scale and scope are huge. There are multiple variables that would need to be measured, and coverage in time and space must be adequate. Even in areas of known seismic activity, this will be very expensive and may not get the intended results.

There had always been inadvertent data collection that raised showed anomalies and raised questions. It is well-known that, in some areas, radon levels elevate in response to the time where the fault is “preparing” to let loose, when the rock is undergoing microfracturing. However, not all faults will produce the same, or any, precursors – each seismic event is unique, even on the same fault. Traditional research in seismology has focused on mechanical observations like ground deformation and prior events. Are seismologists looking in the wrong place? A relatively new concept of a interactive electrical earth system suggests this may be so.

Watching the ionosphere

The five articles I examined (in the References below) discuss the connection between seismic activity and the ionosphere. While it seems strange to find evidence for earthquake activity in the upper reaches of the atmosphere (where the aurora displays), in the last few decades, evidence is mounting for the lithospheric-atmospheric-ionospheric coupling model or LAIC. This model assumes that processes which happen when rock in the earth’s crust is stressed create electrical signals exhibited in the atmosphere. The seismo-electromagnetic phenomenon may be show up as anomalous electrical signals, magnetic field changes, ground temperature variations, atmospheric changes, and luminous phenomenon such as EQLs.

In the crustal lithosphere – the location of the earth’s tectonic plates – pressure during the lead up to fault slip causes microfracturing in the rock. Radon and other gases are released and migrate through fractures and the fault area. Electric currents may also be generated. Different models of how this might work are proposed. Some researches focus on the freed (radioactive) radon that generates ionized air (positive and negative ions). Others propose that negative charges in the fracturing rock induce positive charges to collect at ground level. Localized ionization can increase water vapor condensation and variation in conductivity, and may potentially explain pre-earthquake anomalies such as “earthquake weather”, odd animal and plant behavior, electromagnetic anomalies, glowing ground, strange clouds, etc. Because the atmosphere is dynamic, the effects may rapidly appear or disappear. In the electromagnetic fault model, the ground and the atmosphere interact to produce EQLs of various types or odd clouds.

No layer of the Earth exists in isolation. It is not unreasonable to assume that a large energy event such as a major earthquake would show signals revealed in our earth system. The interactive model of effects contend that the electrical effects propagate into the atmosphere to the ionosphere where they are best observed via satellite. The French satellite DEMETER (Detection of Electro-Magnetic Emissions Transmitted from EQ Regions) operated between 2004 and 2010 specifically to detect electromagnetic phenomena related to quakes and volcanic eruptions. The DEMETER observed significant disturbances in the ionosphere 5 days before the Wenchuan/Sichuan, China earthquake of 2008. The deviation in ion density was observed within 200km of the epicenter. Chinese scientists established a monitoring station in the Sichuan province called MVP-LAI to assess the complex interactions for the future.

I must stress that the relationship between ionospheric anomalies and earthquakes is highly debated. Some previous studies were weak and are refuted. There is difficulty in using satellite observations. Geomagnetic disturbances and meteorological events will interfere with any effects coming from a quake. The proposal that these signals might be used as a warning of a coming quake days or even months ahead creates serious problems with prediction and social ramifications. They remain unreliable, but the ideas are very intriguing and the data is accumulating.

Examples

For various examples of EQLs and anomalies, see my previous article that details the observances in Saguenay, Canada (1988), Matsushiro, Japan (1968) and several other examples include the rainbow cloud from Sichuan 2008. More about this phenomenon has come to light since then.

Sichuan/Wenchuan 12 May 2008
In addition to the DEMETER data, this quake is associated with the infamous “rainbow cloud” that was seen and photographed within several hundred km from the epicenter 10-60 minutes before the quake. Enomoto (2024) concludes this was not the common optical phenomenon known as a circumhorizon arc because it was not localized and was not at the correct angle of the sun. He suggests that it was a different type of light dispersion related to an atmospheric electrical anomaly. The total electron content (TEC) in the atmosphere was noted to increase above the epicenter 37 minutes prior.

Fukushima-oki Japan, 13 February 2021
Multiple parameters were observed by researchers, but the most convincing, according to authors Hayakawa and Hobara (2024), were the ultra and extremely low frequency (ULF/ELF) radio waves that they observed about 1 week prior to the quake, up to the day of the quake. See more below on the second Fukushima event in 2022 that produced flashes.

Kobe, Japan 1995
Luminous clouds were observed an hour before and 27 minutes after this quake accompanied by pulsed radio emissions. The clouds were described “like a fire breathing dragon” by a photographer. The quake area also was host to an unusual spiral cloud eight days prior. A fisherman reported to Enomoto that he observed electric sparks at ground level. Later, Enomoto discovered that a portion of ground area along the fault had been blackened and the grass charred. After analyzing the fault gouge material, and conducting experiments, he concluded that the clay minerals in the fault zone had been subject to a significant current discharge, altering the material that was not found elsewhere. This was published in a separate paper with others in 2001 (noted in my previous post). The Kobe area has a belt of granite that hosts numerous radon springs. Enomoto suggests that released water vapor can carry radon or methane upwards out of the fault area into the atmosphere.

Japan’s historical quakes
Enomoto’s 2024 study looked at a historical list of 872 quakes in Japan and found that 9% of damaging quakes had some mention of EQLs. He took a closer look at 21 of these quakes, including the Kobe even, concluding that the interaction of earth layers are the probable cause of the anomalies, and that it might be possible to predict quakes based on this signals. Some of the other examples mentioned in the historical records include soundless lightning or flashes on a sunny day in various quakes whereby he surmises that an electrical anomaly different than lightning was occurring. Additionally, there were reports of more intense lightning strikes during bad weather associated with quakes. Methane may be implicated in some manifestation of EQLs as the gas could be ignited by frictional heat or static electricity as its emitted from the ground. Methane hydrate eruptions triggered by underwater landslides could appear as glowing seas and pillars of fire off the coast. Reports of these phenomena differ from luminescence produced by phosphorescent organisms.

The Enomoto paper is readable and contains helpful illustrations and diagrams. I recommend checking it out. I would like to share more of the interesting examples in that paper but this post is extensive enough.

Flashes

I have detailed in other posts tagged as “earthquake lights” the obvious misidentification of flashes during a quake. There are definitely flashes that are attributable to transformer explosions and electric arcing from downed wires. Here is an example of that happening during shaking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q65aE8JiPL0

Previously, I held the opinion that all such blue-white flashes filmed at night during quakes were attributable to the electricity distribution network, even though they are now frequently called EQLs by the media. That view has been shaken a bit by the paper by Xie, et al. (2023) related to the Fukushima earthquake of 16 March 2022. During the shaking, a flash burst out from the surface at the Sendai city and airport area. This was captured on two different cameras with one camera capturing two flashes close to each other while the second camera was interrupted so only one was caught. Using the overlap zone of two cameras, the position of the flash area was estimated. Here is the zinger that caught my attention:

“[W]e also collected maintenance reports on electrical facilities after the shock to rule out the possibility of the flashes being caused by explosions in transformers or power supply facilities. The reports on the locations of the malfunctioning power stations showed that some of the power stations along Sendai’s eastern coast did malfunction, but they were far away from where the EQLs appeared in the inland region”.

The authors conclude that the flash was caused by electrical current from the rock and a horizontal magnetic field disturbance. It does not appear to be related to the electricity distribution network.

Here is a video showing various instances of lights seen in the sky during the quake:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8Ma0nkCqis

This is certainly not definitive to say that flashes seen during quakes are EQLs, but it opens the potential that some are. It could be that the blue-white flashes of wires and transformers may produce a similar visual effect as the much rarer EQLs. There is a problem with confirming this conclusion as one would have to be able to document all flashes and match these with utility failures in order to discard those causes. It would be ideal if cameras could capture a flash in a precise location up close to confirm a natural cause. That has not yet happened.

In conclusion, the continuing research into the LAIC and electro-seismic models, notably in China and Japan, is exciting. They consider that observations of atmospheric anomalies are genuine and explainable, not discounted as mistakes or exaggerations. There is an inherent unreliability in eyewitness reports. But, I do think that the difference in tectonic regimes between the US and Asia can result in dismissal of the historical evidence about atmospheric earthquake anomalies. We simply don’t have the same range of seismic incidents, in large cities, that occur in those places. In the not so distant future, we may see greater acceptance of strange reports associated with earthquakes taken seriously as the weight of the evidence and a reasonable mechanism to explain them has won over the scientific community. It looks like serious investigation into the potential explanations for EQLs will continue.

References

Chen, H.; Han, P.; Hattori, K. Recent Advances and Challenges in the Seismo-Electromagnetic Study: A Brief Review. Remote Sens. 2022, 14, 5893. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14225893

De Santis A, Abbattista C, Alfonsi L, Amoruso L, Campuzano SA, Carbone M, Cesaroni C, Cianchini G, De Franceschi G, De Santis A, Di Giovambattista R, Marchetti D, Martino L, Perrone L, Piscini A, Rainone ML, Soldani M, Spogli L, Santoro F. Geosystemics View of Earthquakes. Entropy (Basel). 2019 Apr 18;21(4):412. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7514901/

Enomoto, Y. Earthquake Lights Observed in Japan—Possible Underlying Mechanisms. Atmosphere 2024, 15, 916. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15080916

Hayakawa, M.; Hobara, Y. Integrated Analysis of Multi- Parameter Precursors to the Fukushima Offshore Earthquake (Mj = 7.3) on 13 February 2021 and Lithosphere–Atmosphere– Ionosphere Coupling Channels. Atmosphere 2024, 15, 1015. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15081015

Xie, B.; Wu, L.; Mao, W.; Wang, Z.; Sun, L.; Xu, Y. Horizontal Magnetic Anomaly Accompanying the Co-Seismic Earthquake Light of the M7.3 Fukushima Earthquake of 16 March 2022: Phenomenon and Mechanism. Remote Sens. 2023, 15, 5052. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs15205052

#Anomalies #earthquakeLights #earthquakePrecursors #EQL #ionosphere #LAIC #luminousPhenomena #mysteriousLights #rainbowCloud #skyFlashes #SpookyGeology

https://sharonahill.com/?p=8803

When every flash is an earthquake light, we have lost the plot

Media outlets are picking up and recirculating a thin story about an earthquake light (EQL) that was caught on video (actually, a video recording another screen) from the Aksu, Xinjiang, China quake on January 23. As now happens every time, this is not an earthquake light – it is damage to electrical equipment from the shaking that creates a flash. The video of a distance flash while the foreground shows shaking follows the pattern that repeats with nearly every modern quake. The video was shared via syndication, and various news websites around the world repost the video and spread the misinformation with no context or critical reporting.

Earthquake lights may be a genuine phenomenon that occurs only under very specific geologic conditions. If they are natural at all, they are rare and have not been adequately documented in order to make any scientific determinations as to their cause. However, all blue or white flashes that regularly result from broken wires and exploding transformers associated with an earthquake are more often caught on cameras and shared as representing a natural phenomenon.

The overuse of the term, earthquake light, is having the effect of negating and conflating information about natural EQLs. The term is being diluted and changed so that it no longer means what it originally intended. It now means something much less interesting. News is making us dumber.

For more on EQLs, see my other posts on Earthquake Lights

#China #earthquake #earthquakeLights #news

https://sharonahill.com/?p=8392

Media hypes questionable “mysterious” earthquake lights in Morocco

Claims of blue flashes and floating balls of light were associated with the latest strong quake

After every sizable earthquake these days, it is inevitable that several people on social media will post a photo or video of what they claim are anomalous luminous phenomena associated with the quake. It is usually security footage that shows bright blue flashes in the distance, never close up. Such lights on the horizon typically occur seconds before or during when the shaking is felt at the camera site. They are immediately labeled “earthquake lights” and some confident commenter asserts that they are a “well-known” and “real” phenomenon that is a result of electrical charges released by the shaking.

This is probably entirely wrong.

It happened soon after the Moroccan quake that took place before midnight on 8 September.

I have collected and reviewed as much genuine research as I could about earthquake lights (EQLs) for many years and presented my compilation here on this website. I have an alert whenever earthquake lights pop up in the news, and it was popping this week as many news sources quickly picked up on the videos and associated claims circulating on social media.

The New York Times was one of the first to publish, using quotes from a physicist specializing in deformation and failure of materials, and from a retired seismologist who wrote about earthquake phenomenon. The writer also referenced the USGS’s info on EQLs. But the quotes felt out of context and not specific to the slim evidence presented for the Morocco event.

Video of blue flashes

The main video circulating associated with this quake showed two flashes of white-blue light on the horizon. No shaking was apparent in the video. The video shows a time of 23:08:24 for the first flash at the far left edge, and then 2 seconds later there is another flash slightly farther from the left edge.

It is not clear where this video was taken. The language barrier is a typical hindrance to finding out useful details. The Morocco earthquake took place at 22:11:01 UTC. This does correspond to the hour of this time zone, but not the minutes, which is two minutes earlier. It’s not unreasonable to assume the camera clock was slightly off.

These flashes look very much like electrical arcing/flashes from wiring, identical to almost every EQL video that has made the rounds in the past few years. We know electrical wiring and transformers disconnect and arc from the ground shaking, and this does create the bright white-blue light. The flashes are most often followed immediately by a power outage, evident in some videos. But not this one. Unfortunately, the video cuts off after 27 seconds; we can’t see if subsequent shaking occurred. The bright flashes appear to be very far away. Light travels much faster than earthquake pressure waves, so I’m not surprised by the lack of shaking, really.

Perhaps the flashes are anomalous. I’m inclined to go with the simpler and established cause – that we are seeing a result of electrical infrastructure failure. Regardless, the single unverified video leaves plenty of questions, so this is not a reliable piece of evidence. We don’t appear to have corresponding video evidence that could confirm either the electric wire idea or a potential anomaly.

News sources picked up the claims

Major news sources quoted the same sources as the NYT or added comments from John Derr and Friedman Freund, the two primary English-speaking experts on EQLs. Considering the history of this topic and the questionable nature of this video, I would be shocked if any seismologist would confidently express that the lights in this video were EQLs. The alternative down-to-earth explanation is far more reasonable.

Some, but not most, of the coverage on this story included the mundane explanation. But it was buried in a short paragraph near the end after the “mystery” of EQLs was hyped.

EQLs seem to have become the umbrella term for any lights or glowing in the sky coincident with an earthquake. EQLs, however, if they are a real geological occurrence, are complex and the manifestation is extremely rare.

In other reports of EQL across the world and through time, people report sightings of luminous phenomena that do not resemble single flashes. There are pseudo-EQLs that can be explained by other causes unrelated to earthquakes. It certainly seems that false ideas about EQLs have become contagious thanks to social media. People have heard so much about luminous anomalies that they jump to the wrong conclusions about stuff in the sky.

Additional questionable evidence

The second video circulated from Morocco claimed to show hovering light balls in the sky in Marrakech. Here is a screenshot.

There is no confirmation of date or time on this video. These lights could have other prosaic explanations. They look like floating paper lanterns to me. Had the lights been seen traveling nearer to the ground or exiting the ground, I’d be impressed. This does not impress me. It’s not useful as evidence.

Fake news always follows natural disasters

When a natural disaster strikes, people are often desperate for news and reasons. These days coverage of disasters is inevitably accompanied by misattributed and fake images and videos and conspiracy ideas. This event was no exception. Several of the recycled social media claims were also used for the Turkiye-Syria quake back in February. People are either careless or deliberately recirculate inappropriate content, showing damage or dramatic rescues, because the topic is highly emotional. People will click. And then they will share. Even though we have the ability to show the claims are bogus, the lies continue and are detrimental to society.

TikTok, that most efficient and super-popular misinformation generator/spreader, was at the forefront distributing a CGI video (originally from 2020) showing swirling lights in the sky that generated a “laser beam” that commenters asserted caused the Morocco earthquake. The clearly manufactured video does not even depict a city in Morocco. The video was referenced as depicting an alien invasion or attributed to the HAARP research project. HAARP has been perpetually misunderstood and used as a “cause” of all kinds of disasters. None of it has any basis in fact.

The ubiquity of attributing natural events to nefarious entities reveals not only the sense of distrust society has with science and government projects, but a general sense of how little the public understands nature. It’s jaw-dropping that people can’t recognize such obvious fakery. We live in Strange Times. If you take away anything from this, please be skeptical of claims of dramatic anomalies and bizarre fringe claims related to natural disasters. People are already having a hard enough time in these affected areas. The last thing we need is more complete bullshit.

#earthquakeLights #earthquakes #Morocco

https://sharonahill.com/?p=7626

Media hypes questionable “mysterious” earthquake lights in Morocco

Published Sept 15, 2023

Claims of blue flashes and floating balls of light were associated with the latest strong quake

After every sizable earthquake these days, it is inevitable that several people on social media will post a photo or video of what they claim are anomalous luminous phenomena associated with the quake. It is usually security footage that shows bright blue flashes in the distance, never close up. Such lights on the horizon typically occur seconds before or during when the shaking is felt at the camera site. They are immediately labeled “earthquake lights” and some confident commenter asserts that they are a “well-known” and “real” phenomenon that is a result of electrical charges released by the shaking.

This is probably entirely wrong.

It happened soon after the Moroccan quake that took place before midnight on 8 September.

I have collected and reviewed as much genuine research as I could about earthquake lights (EQLs) for many years. I have an alert whenever earthquake lights pop up in the news, and it was popping this week as many news sources quickly picked up on the videos and associated claims circulating on social media.

The New York Times was one of the first to publish, using quotes from a physicist specializing in deformation and failure of materials, and from a retired seismologist who wrote about earthquake phenomenon. The writer also referenced the USGS’s info on EQLs. But the quotes felt out of context and not specific to the slim evidence presented for the Morocco event.

Video of blue flashes

The main video circulating associated with this quake showed two flashes of white-blue light on the horizon. No shaking was apparent in the video. The video shows a time of 23:08:24 for the first flash at the far left edge, and then 2 seconds later there is another flash slightly farther from the left edge.

It is not clear where this video was taken. The language barrier is a typical hindrance to finding out useful details. The Morocco earthquake took place at 22:11:01 UTC. This does correspond to the hour of this time zone, but not the minutes, which is two minutes earlier. It’s not unreasonable to assume the camera clock was slightly off.

These flashes look very much like electrical arcing/flashes from wiring, identical to almost every EQL video that has made the rounds in the past few years. We know electrical wiring and transformers disconnect and arc from the ground shaking, and this does create the bright white-blue light. The flashes are most often followed immediately by a power outage, evident in some videos. But not this one. Unfortunately, the video cuts off after 27 seconds; we can’t see if subsequent shaking occurred. The bright flashes appear to be very far away. Light travels much faster than earthquake pressure waves, so I’m not surprised by the lack of shaking, really.

Perhaps the flashes are anomalous. I’m inclined to go with the simpler and established cause – that we are seeing a result of electrical infrastructure failure. Regardless, the single unverified video leaves plenty of questions, so this is not a reliable piece of evidence. We don’t appear to have corresponding video evidence that could confirm either the electric wire idea or a potential anomaly.

News sources picked up the claims

Major news sources quoted the same sources as the NYT or added comments from John Derr and Friedman Freund, the two primary English-speaking experts on EQLs. Considering the history of this topic and the questionable nature of this video, I would be shocked if any seismologist would confidently express that the lights in this video were EQLs. The alternative down-to-earth explanation is far more reasonable.

Some, but not most, of the coverage on this story included the mundane explanation. But it was buried in a short paragraph near the end after the “mystery” of EQLs was hyped.

EQLs seem to have become the umbrella term for any lights or glowing in the sky coincident with an earthquake. EQLs, however, if they are a real geological occurrence, are complex and the manifestation is extremely rare.

In other reports of EQL across the world and through time, people report sightings of luminous phenomena that do not resemble single flashes. There are pseudo-EQLs that can be explained by other causes unrelated to earthquakes. It certainly seems that false ideas about EQLs have become contagious thanks to social media. People have heard so much about luminous anomalies that they jump to the wrong conclusions about stuff in the sky.

Additional questionable evidence

The second video circulated from Morocco claimed to show hovering light balls in the sky in Marrakech. Here is a screenshot.

There is no confirmation of date or time on this video. These lights could have other prosaic explanations. They look like floating paper lanterns to me. Had the lights been seen traveling nearer to the ground or exiting the ground, I’d be impressed. This does not impress me. It’s not useful as evidence.

Fake news always follows natural disasters

When a natural disaster strikes, people are often desperate for news and reasons. These days coverage of disasters is inevitably accompanied by misattributed and fake images and videos and conspiracy ideas. This event was no exception. Several of the recycled social media claims were also used for the Turkiye-Syria quake back in February. People are either careless or deliberately recirculate inappropriate content, showing damage or dramatic rescues, because the topic is highly emotional. People will click. And then they will share. Even though we have the ability to show the claims are bogus, the lies continue and are detrimental to society.

TikTok, that most efficient and super-popular misinformation generator/spreader, was at the forefront distributing a CGI video (originally from 2020) showing swirling lights in the sky that generated a “laser beam” that commenters asserted caused the Morocco earthquake. The clearly manufactured video does not even depict a city in Morocco. The video was referenced as depicting an alien invasion or attributed to the HAARP research project. HAARP has been perpetually misunderstood and used as a “cause” of all kinds of disasters. None of it has any basis in fact.

The ubiquity of attributing natural events to nefarious entities reveals not only the sense of distrust society has with science and government projects, but a general sense of how little the public understands nature. It’s jaw-dropping that people can’t recognize such obvious fakery. We live in Strange Times. If you take away anything from this, please be skeptical of claims of dramatic anomalies and bizarre fringe claims related to natural disasters. People are already having a hard enough time in these affected areas. The last thing we need is more complete bullshit.

#earthquakeLights #earthquakes #Morocco #SpookyGeology

https://sharonahill.com/?p=7626

Earthquake lights (pseudoEQLs) video from India

On 21-March 2023 at 16:47 UTC, an M 6.5 earthquake was recorded in the Hindu Kush region, 40 km SSE of Jurm, Afghanistan (36.523°N 70.979°E). The effects were felt over a wide area in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and other neighboring countries. The quake was noticed at around 10:30 PM in the Haryana district of India, northwest of New Delhi. It was in the town of Yamunanagar where several people recorded lights in the sky soon after the quake and published these videos on social media calling them “earthquake lights” (EQLs).

There were at least three different videos posted to Twitter that showed a fixed spot in the cloudy night sky that is changing colors. The colors cycle in a uniform pattern across the span of a few seconds – orange-red-purple-blue-green. Then repeated. All of the videos appeared to be of the same phenomenon, in the same town, although different locations were mistakenly given in copied social media posts. However, it has not been determined if all the videos were taken on the night of 21-March in association with the quake.

Those that commented on the lights were insistent that they were related to the recent quake and called the sky colors “earthquake lights”. Several people online chimed in authoritatively to describe how earthquake lights form, as if they are a well-known phenomenon. The lights were associated with the flashes that were seen during the Turkey-Syria quake in February. (Those lights were not earthquake lights but exploding transformers.)

Media outlets in India reported on the lights. Some declared they were indeed earthquake lights (EQLs), with a few sources expounding on their scientific formation. In no instance was a seismologist or earth scientist consulted as part of this explanation. It looks like the journalists mostly Googled the topic. Across the web, random people gave their unqualified opinions. This is rather easy to do in the case of EQLs, whose reality is not yet acknowledged by the majority of earth scientists. If they do occur, they would be extremely rare. The mechanism of their manifestation is not yet established.

Those saying these sky colors were EQLs were entirely wrong. They were most certainly human-made lights.

The lights in the sky in Yamunanagar were caused by a reflection of surface lights onto the low clouds.

The giveaway for this is the colors. No EQLs have ever been reported to change colors like this and glow in one specific section of the sky. The source of the lights is almost certainly the City Mall in Yamunanagar which has a light display board that emits these bright colors.

It appears that any lights in the sky associated with the perception of earthquake shaking will be called “earthquake lights” even when they are manufactured, a result of damage to power lines, or storm-related lightning – I’ll call these “pseudoEQLs” because they are not a result of earth stresses affecting the atmosphere.

Videos of the pseudoEQLs are now so well known that people look for lights in response to earthquake shaking. When they find them, they are attributed to the quake because they have been repeatedly told by media misinformation that this is so.

#Delhi #earthLights #earthquake #earthquakeLights #earthquakes #EQL #India #pseudoEQLs #Yamunanagar

https://sharonahill.com/?p=2737

Earthquake lights (pseudoEQLs) video from India

On 21-March 2023 at 16:47 UTC, an M 6.5 earthquake was recorded in the Hindu Kush region, 40 km SSE of Jurm, Afghanistan (36.523°N 70.979°E). The effects were felt over a wide area in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and other neighboring countries. The quake was noticed at around 10:30 PM in the Haryana district of India, northwest of New Delhi. It was in the town of Yamunanagar where several people recorded lights in the sky soon after the quake and published these videos on social media calling them “earthquake lights” (EQLs).

There were at least three different videos posted to Twitter that showed a fixed spot in the cloudy night sky that is changing colors. The colors cycle in a uniform pattern across the span of a few seconds – orange-red-purple-blue-green. Then repeated. All of the videos appeared to be of the same phenomenon, in the same town, although different locations were mistakenly given in copied social media posts. However, it has not been determined if all the videos were taken on the night of 21-March in association with the quake.

Those that commented on the lights were insistent that they were related to the recent quake and called the sky colors “earthquake lights”. Several people online chimed in authoritatively to describe how earthquake lights form, as if they are a well-known phenomenon. The lights were associated with the flashes that were seen during the Turkey-Syria quake in February. (Those lights were not earthquake lights but exploding transformers.)

Media outlets in India reported on the lights. Some declared they were indeed earthquake lights (EQLs), with a few sources expounding on their scientific formation. In no instance was a seismologist or earth scientist consulted as part of this explanation. It looks like the journalists mostly Googled the topic. Across the web, random people gave their unqualified opinions. This is rather easy to do in the case of EQLs, whose reality is not yet acknowledged by the majority of earth scientists. If they do occur, they would be extremely rare. The mechanism of their manifestation is not yet established.

Those saying these sky colors were EQLs were entirely wrong. They were most certainly human-made lights.

The lights in the sky in Yamunanagar were caused by a reflection of surface lights onto the low clouds.

The giveaway for this is the colors. No EQLs have ever been reported to change colors like this and glow in one specific section of the sky. The source of the lights is almost certainly the City Mall in Yamunanagar which has a light display board that emits these bright colors.

It appears that any lights in the sky associated with the perception of earthquake shaking will be called “earthquake lights” even when they are manufactured, a result of damage to power lines, or storm-related lightning – I’ll call these “pseudoEQLs” because they are not a result of earth stresses affecting the atmosphere.

Videos of the pseudoEQLs are now so well known that people look for lights in response to earthquake shaking. When they find them, they are attributed to the quake because they have been repeatedly told by media misinformation that this is so.

More:

EARTHQUAKE LIGHTS feature

Anomalous claims from Turkey-Syria earthquake 2023

Spooky events from the New Madrid earthquakes

#Delhi #earthLights #earthquake #earthquakeLights #earthquakes #EQL #India #pseudoEQLs #Yamunanagar

https://sharonahill.com/?p=2737

Anomalous claims from Turkey-Syria earthquake 2023

With a flood of images and videos coming out of the affected area in southern and central Turkey and western Syria from the February 6, 2023 series of quakes, there are MANY inaccuracies, misattributed content, conspiracies, and pseudoscientific claims being shared and promoted by nonexperts.

It is sad because the real disaster provided more than enough drama to handle. The images from Turkey (Turkiye) and Syria are horrific and disturbing. It is detestable that fake information is embraced and often used for ugly purposes. In this post, I collect some of the more prominent bullshit circulating about the catastrophic event and point out that it’s not that difficult to spot the problems. In short, do not distribute such posts on social media until you have multiple and legitimate sources to support outrageous claims being made.

Earthquake lights videos

The following video seems legitimate and appeared on social media shortly after the quake. It was supposedly from Hatay province but I can’t verify that. The video depicts flashing lights in the sky that were then interpreted as “earthquake lights”.

Some details to note: The shaking is not particularly bad at first. The blue flashes are seen in the distance. The second large flash (around 0:13) coincides with the lights going out in the foreground. As the shaking really affects the person with the camera, you can see blue flashes nearer to the location, possibly along the street. All of these characteristics together suggest we are seeing electrical transformers exploding and power lines arcing as they are broken.

In addition, an Italian site noted that there was stormy weather in the area at the time. So, possibly some of the lightning (in this or other videos of “earthquake lightning”) could have just been typical lightning.

As with other examples, such as those seen in the past few years in Mexico City and New Zealand, which look similar, odds are they are a result of electricity failures. They are not “piezoelectric” or “triboluminescence” as many armchair scientists are positing on social media. Those are over-simplistic and mistaken ideas about how earthquake lights might manifest. Beware of “experts” who suddenly speak authoritatively using big words who aren’t citing legitimate scientific research.

See the Spooky Geology EARTHQUAKE LIGHTS feature

Another frequently shared video said to depict the sky during the time of the quake is far less credible. It’s not clear where this one came from but it shows pinkish-white flashes of light. Again, these appear to be explosions. However, most viewers ignore the date which is either set wrong or is evidence that this was not taken at the time of the quake because it reads 11-23-2022.

Worse than using old and outdated ideas, many are speculating that the sky flashes are related to HAARP – a research program that runs experiments and makes observations on the upper atmosphere. It has absolutely nothing to do with this research center which is located in Alaska. Anyone who suggests HAARP as a cause is steeped in conspiratorial content and doesn’t understand what HAARP is or how it works.

Finally, images and videos depicting a raging fire in the distance are genuine. But this did not occur prior to the quake but after as a result of gas fires that ignited after lines were damaged.

Animals acting strangely

The first video that came out suggesting that animals were behaving strangely prior to the quake was this one of birds flying around the city.

There is no indication of time or location in this short. When I first noticed it via Twitter feed, commenters said this was not unusual. Unless we have more detail and comparisons, there is nothing we can conclude about this video to say that animals (birds) reacted to some unusual environmental condition. One observation is that the birds are flying and landing; they are not flying away. If the birds detected some natural disaster, one would expect they would exit, not land.

A security camera recorded a free-roaming dog howling in the street. The context was added that it happened prior to the quake. Again, there is no indication of time or place. The earthquake took place at 4:15 AM local time. We don’t know how long prior to the event this dog let loose his mournful howl or why. The claim was submitted to the Snopes fact checking site but they came to no conclusions. While unnerving, a random dog howling in the street does not mean that animals know what is coming.

Anomalies in the sky

In mid-January, social media feeds were excited over a strange red lenticular cloud that appeared over the northwestern Turkish city of Bursa. Because Chinese culture associates strange clouds with earthquakes, people are now connecting this occurrence to the earthquake weeks later. There is no connection. The cloud was caused by the movement of air in the mountainous region in the far northwest portion of the country. The epicenter of the quake was near the south east city of Gaziantep. There is no physical connection between the two.

A video being passed around TikTok suggests that a bright fast moving light in the sky prior to the quake was related to it. Not sure who hasn’t seen a SpaceX launch, but that’s what this is. It’s another example of wrong place, wrong time, with no connection to the earthquake. Notice how this screen cap shows that the original video was taken from someone else and the label placed across. It’s not clear if people do this for clicks but someone must make the decision to link the events together whether they know they are being deceptive or not.

Assertion that the quake was predicted

A notorious Dutchman named Frank Hoogerbeets posted on Twitter on February 3 that an earthquake was imminent in the region. But there are multiple problems with the conclusion that he “predicted” the quake. First, look at the wording – it’s general and describes an area that is extremely seismically active. Because he was not specific, this helped no one. He doesn’t explain why he thinks the time is ripe for the fault to break, he doesn’t indicate the location. He got lucky. It happens sometimes. What we can be sure of is that “geometry between celestial bodies” isn’t a sound basis for saying earthquakes will happen.

Hoogerbeets is a self-described “quake mystic” with a worldwide following. In 2018, he preached that a rare cosmic event at Christmas could trigger a “megaquake”. It didn’t happen. He’s well-known as one of those people who keep beating the drum about a coming quake. A broken clock is right twice a day. After many years of peppering the public with his predictions, he finally got lucky. You’d be foolish to put any trust in a guy with that kind of record and no reasonable mechanism except pseudoscientific hand waving. But lots of people are now erroneously calling him successful.

Belief that quake in Buffalo was related

Some 11 hours after the first quake on the Anatolian fault, a 3.8 magnitude quake rattled Buffalo, New York, a place not used to noticeable seismicity. Some people latched on to the correlation and assumed that the earth energy that caused one was related to the other. But there is no connection between them. The fault rupture was severe in Turkey-Syria but localized only to that area. The first quake caused a stress change that triggered aftershocks along that fault and connected faults. But such effects are not transmitted more than 500 km in distance.

Unfortunately, there are many people who subscribe to an apocalyptic vision of days and think that all natural anomalies or disasters are a signal of the end times. They aren’t aware that the earth is dynamic and quakes happen all the time, even in unexpected places.

Tsunami fizzled

In the past decade, news consumers have become accustomed to the relationship between earthquakes and tsunamis. When news of the latest event started to circulate, at least two videos showing tsunamis also began to circulate. Both depicted past events in other areas but they did lead people to think that waves had made things worse for the devastated countries. There had been a tsunami warning issued for Mediterranean coastal areas in neighboring countries. It was not an unreasonable fear. Soon, a 2018 video from Palu, Indonesia and a 2017 video from Durban, South Africa were circulating with false claims they were recent and from Turkey. The International Tsunami Center confirmed that very small (7 inch) waves had been recorded at the shores but did not cause damage.

Man-made disaster conspiracy

As mentioned above, the conspirasphere loves HAARP so much that it is the go-to excuse for any anomaly – a ridiculous and silly assertion. But maybe not as silly as the claim that the light flashes were from “space weapons” and that the quakes were a retaliation, somehow created by the US and other NATO countries, to punish Turkey for their political positions. It’s sad to have to say how unhinged these ideas are – there is no way to trigger a quake like this. Turkey is naturally very prone to earthquakes. There is no need to manufacture a quake when the extensive active faults do their destruction without any prompting.

What made the building destruction worse was related to humans. It was the years of wars in Syria and the lack of building code enforcement that allowed unstable masonry structures to be susceptible to collapse and, thus, resulting in the massive death toll. The first event, unfortunately, took place at night, when people were in buildings. It was cold, so people were less likely to be outside. And, the shallowness of the rupture meant that the surface waves were devastatingly destructive. It’s obscene to ignore the preventable or understandable characteristics of this event and to focus on imaginary villains and science fiction only to feed a view count or gain followers and attention.

Fake news is the norm

It is now a given than any disaster will be accompanied by social media videos that do not depict what they say they do. Old footage and images are recycled either on purpose or without thought. They are then viewed and shared without thought. A growing audience who applied no critical evaluation to the evidence now believes a falsehood about the event because the images feel so appropriate and add to the drama. Fact checking is left to others or ignored entirely. When the content is explained or debunked, the truth is not passed along to the same extent and it’s often rejected in favor of the more interesting fakery and lies.

I’ll update this post as needed to reflect additional claims or information. I would greatly appreciate submittals of reliable references for consideration. With this post, I am not discounting the potential that some truly remarkable and anomalous observations accompanied this event. But the evidence to support remarkable claims must be equally as impressive.

#animalBehavior #animalsAndEarthquakes #BuffaloEarthquake #earthquakeLightning #earthquakeLights #earthquakePrediction #earthquakes #HAARP #Pseudoscience #sky #tsunami #TurkeyEarthquake #TurkeySyriaEarthquake #TurkiyeEarthquake

https://sharonahill.com/?p=2610

Anomalous claims from Turkey-Syria earthquake 2023

With a flood of images and videos coming out of the affected area in southern and central Turkey and western Syria from the February 6, 2023 series of quakes, there are MANY inaccuracies, misattributed content, conspiracies, and pseudoscientific claims being shared and promoted by nonexperts.

It is sad because the real disaster provided more than enough drama to handle. The images from Turkey (Turkiye) and Syria are horrific and disturbing. It is detestable that fake information is embraced and often used for ugly purposes. In this post, I collect some of the more prominent bullshit circulating about the catastrophic event and point out that it’s not that difficult to spot the problems. In short, do not distribute such posts on social media until you have multiple and legitimate sources to support outrageous claims being made.

Earthquake lights videos

The following video seems legitimate and appeared on social media shortly after the quake. It was supposedly from Hatay province but I can’t verify that. The video depicts flashing lights in the sky that were then interpreted as “earthquake lights”.

Some details to note: The shaking is not particularly bad at first. The blue flashes are seen in the distance. The second large flash (around 0:13) coincides with the lights going out in the foreground. As the shaking really affects the person with the camera, you can see blue flashes nearer to the location, possibly along the street. All of these characteristics together suggest we are seeing electrical transformers exploding and power lines arcing as they are broken.

In addition, an Italian site noted that there was stormy weather in the area at the time. So, possibly some of the lightning (in this or other videos of “earthquake lightning”) could have just been typical lightning.

As with other examples, such as those seen in the past few years in Mexico City and New Zealand, which look similar, odds are they are a result of electricity failures. They are not “piezoelectric” or “triboluminescence” as many armchair scientists are positing on social media. Those are over-simplistic and mistaken ideas about how earthquake lights might manifest. Beware of “experts” who suddenly speak authoritatively using big words who aren’t citing legitimate scientific research.

Another frequently shared video said to depict the sky during the time of the quake is far less credible. It’s not clear where this one came from but it shows pinkish-white flashes of light. Again, these appear to be explosions. However, most viewers ignore the date which is either set wrong or is evidence that this was not taken at the time of the quake because it reads 11-23-2022.

Worse than using old and outdated ideas, many are speculating that the sky flashes are related to HAARP – a research program that runs experiments and makes observations on the upper atmosphere. It has absolutely nothing to do with this research center which is located in Alaska. Anyone who suggests HAARP as a cause is steeped in conspiratorial content and doesn’t understand what HAARP is or how it works.

Finally, images and videos depicting a raging fire in the distance are genuine. But this did not occur prior to the quake but after as a result of gas fires that ignited after lines were damaged.

Animals acting strangely

The first video that came out suggesting that animals were behaving strangely prior to the quake was this one of birds flying around the city.

There is no indication of time or location in this short. When I first noticed it via Twitter feed, commenters said this was not unusual. Unless we have more detail and comparisons, there is nothing we can conclude about this video to say that animals (birds) reacted to some unusual environmental condition. One observation is that the birds are flying and landing; they are not flying away. If the birds detected some natural disaster, one would expect they would exit, not land.

A security camera recorded a free-roaming dog howling in the street. The context was added that it happened prior to the quake. Again, there is no indication of time or place. The earthquake took place at 4:15 AM local time. We don’t know how long prior to the event this dog let loose his mournful howl or why. The claim was submitted to the Snopes fact checking site but they came to no conclusions. While unnerving, a random dog howling in the street does not mean that animals know what is coming.

Anomalies in the sky

In mid-January, social media feeds were excited over a strange red lenticular cloud that appeared over the northwestern Turkish city of Bursa. Because Chinese culture associates strange clouds with earthquakes, people are now connecting this occurrence to the earthquake weeks later. There is no connection. The cloud was caused by the movement of air in the mountainous region in the far northwest portion of the country. The epicenter of the quake was near the south east city of Gaziantep. There is no physical connection between the two.

A video being passed around TikTok suggests that a bright fast moving light in the sky prior to the quake was related to it. Not sure who hasn’t seen a SpaceX launch, but that’s what this is. It’s another example of wrong place, wrong time, with no connection to the earthquake. Notice how this screen cap shows that the original video was taken from someone else and the label placed across. It’s not clear if people do this for clicks but someone must make the decision to link the events together whether they know they are being deceptive or not.

Assertion that the quake was predicted

A notorious Dutchman named Frank Hoogerbeets posted on Twitter on February 3 that an earthquake was imminent in the region. But there are multiple problems with the conclusion that he “predicted” the quake. First, look at the wording – it’s general and describes an area that is extremely seismically active. Because he was not specific, this helped no one. He doesn’t explain why he thinks the time is ripe for the fault to break, he doesn’t indicate the location. He got lucky. It happens sometimes. What we can be sure of is that “geometry between celestial bodies” isn’t a sound basis for saying earthquakes will happen.

Hoogerbeets is a self-described “quake mystic” with a worldwide following. In 2018, he preached that a rare cosmic event at Christmas could trigger a “megaquake”. It didn’t happen. He’s well-known as one of those people who keep beating the drum about a coming quake. A broken clock is right twice a day. After many years of peppering the public with his predictions, he finally got lucky. You’d be foolish to put any trust in a guy with that kind of record and no reasonable mechanism except pseudoscientific hand waving. But lots of people are now erroneously calling him successful.

Belief that quake in Buffalo was related

Some 11 hours after the first quake on the Anatolian fault, a 3.8 magnitude quake rattled Buffalo, New York, a place not used to noticeable seismicity. Some people latched on to the correlation and assumed that the earth energy that caused one was related to the other. But there is no connection between them. The fault rupture was severe in Turkey-Syria but localized only to that area. The first quake caused a stress change that triggered aftershocks along that fault and connected faults. But such effects are not transmitted more than 500 km in distance.

Unfortunately, there are many people who subscribe to an apocalyptic vision of days and think that all natural anomalies or disasters are a signal of the end times. They aren’t aware that the earth is dynamic and quakes happen all the time, even in unexpected places.

Tsunami fizzled

In the past decade, news consumers have become accustomed to the relationship between earthquakes and tsunamis. When news of the latest event started to circulate, at least two videos showing tsunamis also began to circulate. Both depicted past events in other areas but they did lead people to think that waves had made things worse for the devastated countries. There had been a tsunami warning issued for Mediterranean coastal areas in neighboring countries. It was not an unreasonable fear. Soon, a 2018 video from Palu, Indonesia and a 2017 video from Durban, South Africa were circulating with false claims they were recent and from Turkey. The International Tsunami Center confirmed that very small (7 inch) waves had been recorded at the shores but did not cause damage.

Man-made disaster conspiracy

As mentioned above, the conspirasphere loves HAARP so much that it is the go-to excuse for any anomaly – a ridiculous and silly assertion. But maybe not as silly as the claim that the light flashes were from “space weapons” and that the quakes were a retaliation, somehow created by the US and other NATO countries, to punish Turkey for their political positions. It’s sad to have to say how unhinged these ideas are – there is no way to trigger a quake like this. Turkey is naturally very prone to earthquakes. There is no need to manufacture a quake when the extensive active faults do their destruction without any prompting.

What made the building destruction worse was related to humans. It was the years of wars in Syria and the lack of building code enforcement that allowed unstable masonry structures to be susceptible to collapse and, thus, resulting in the massive death toll. The first event, unfortunately, took place at night, when people were in buildings. It was cold, so people were less likely to be outside. And, the shallowness of the rupture meant that the surface waves were devastatingly destructive. It’s obscene to ignore the preventable or understandable characteristics of this event and to focus on imaginary villains and science fiction only to feed a view count or gain followers and attention.

Fake news is the norm

It is now a given than any disaster will be accompanied by social media videos that do not depict what they say they do. Old footage and images are recycled either on purpose or without thought. They are then viewed and shared without thought. A growing audience who applied no critical evaluation to the evidence now believes a falsehood about the event because the images feel so appropriate and add to the drama. Fact checking is left to others or ignored entirely. When the content is explained or debunked, the truth is not passed along to the same extent and it’s often rejected in favor of the more interesting fakery and lies.

I’ll update this post as needed to reflect additional claims or information. I would greatly appreciate submittals of reliable references for consideration. With this post, I am not discounting the potential that some truly remarkable and anomalous observations accompanied this event. But the evidence to support remarkable claims must be equally as impressive.

#animalBehavior #animalsAndEarthquakes #BuffaloEarthquake #earthquakeLightning #earthquakeLights #earthquakePrediction #earthquakes #HAARP #Pseudoscience #sky #tsunami #TurkeyEarthquake #TurkeySyriaEarthquake #TurkiyeEarthquake

https://sharonahill.com/?p=2610

Spooky events from the New Madrid earthquakes

A series of giant earthquakes within the continental interior is strange in itself, but other notable phenomena associated with the New Madrid, Missouri quakes of 1811-2 made the events preternaturally awful. In this piece, I explore the scary and weird features that were said to accompany the New Madrid earthquakes. 

An omen

The Great Comet was discovered in March of 1811 and, as the year went on, it figured prominently in peoples’ thoughts as it became more visible. While a few considered it favorable, more people thought it a bad omen of things to come. In December, in New Madrid, Missouri, the comet was mentioned as visible when the first of a series of great earthquakes hit. The blazing feature in the sky was far from the only awe-inspiring aspect of nature that would be on display that winter in this frontier town. 

The beginning

Early in the morning (2 AM) of December 16, 1811, the residents of the small Mississippi river town were awakened by the rumbling earth. They ran out of their houses and attempted to keep warm until the cold day dawned. The daylight brought another shock as people observed the ground rolling like ocean waves. On the river, the waves were huge, overtopping fishing boats and casting vessels upon the shore. Those boats that dared to traverse the roiling current of the river were in constant peril from the floating trees, debris, subsided sand bars, and collapsing cliffs. 

The shocks continued regularly but eventually diminished. Another large quake like the first happened on January 23, 1812. Another two weeks after that the worst came. On February 7,  several shocks, including the largest, hit. For days after, shuddering aftershocks were nearly constant. A year later, the small events continued, but by this time, people had either moved away or had grown used to them. Thousands of aftershocks occurred in total. 

The area was sparsely inhabited so, surprisingly, few people died. Brick structures, which were uncommon except for chimneys, faired worse than wood buildings. Though the exact number can never be known, some people died from house collapses, one man died by falling into soft ground, and at least six from the caving banks. Many more drowned or were never found, including countless (and uncounted) indigenous people. We don’t dare imagine what the consequences would be today of such a calamity. The US has not experienced a geologic cataclysm of such size and widespread impact since then. 

Spooky happenings

There were many spooky characteristics associated with the New Madrid quakes of 1811-2. Stories about them have grown to mythic proportions. Here I attempt a summary of some of the notable features of these quakes and try to clarify the probable truth of the tales. 

To preface these claims, it’s crucial to understand that communication in the early 1800s was primitive. Even though the eastern states knew something odd had happened in the west, they had no information that a series of earthquakes were the cause. The lack of good records makes it very difficult to tell which accounts were true and which were misinterpreted, embellished, or manufactured. With the exception of a few personal journals, the stories were recorded years later. The first professional study by the USGS was not until 1912, one hundred years later. In short order, the original claims grew tall in the telling. We really have no way to discern the accuracy of most of the descriptions provided by obviously panicked witnesses who had never experienced such a thing before and where there was little physical evidence of the phenomena left behind, though some geological remnants of the upheaval still exist.

Precursors

In recent times, geologists have discovered that large quakes had previously occurred in this seismically active zone before 1811. But the new settlers to the land had no idea about earthquakes or what was about to break upon them. There was only one suggestion of a precursor. William Leigh Pierce, who was traveling down the Mississippi, described that on the 30th of November 1811 “two electrical columns shot up from the eastern horizon”. Then the air for the next two weeks was hazy. Pierce’s account (in the notes appendix for The Year: A Poem, in Three Cantoes) does not mention where this observation took place. He would have had to be to the west of New Madrid even though he was traveling from Pittsburgh (from north and east). He notes a corroborating observation from William Duval in “Charleston” on the Ohio. This report is certainly intriguing, but it is confusing. Even though Pierce suggests such atmospheric precursors were common, they aren’t. His report is flimsy evidence to support the reality of a highly strange observation. 

From earth’s abyss electric flashes pour’d

The Year, Canto 1, Part IV

Enough chaos and weirdness would soon manifest for all to experience.

Land

The quakes had the most devastating effects in Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Illinois. The area near the intersection of these states would later be labeled as the New Madrid Seismic Zone. There were no scientific seismographs at this time in history, however. Judging by the damage accounts, the quakes were estimated to be of magnitudes between 7 and 8. But because they were in the continental crust, the energy transmitted great distances. The quakes were felt as far north as Montreal, Canada and to South Carolina.

The land in the town of New Madrid was mostly underlain by unconsolidated river deposits. Eyewitnesses claimed the land surface rose and fell, undulating in terrifying waves, throwing people to the ground. At the wave peaks, the earth would “burst” out soil, sand, water, and pieces of shaly coal. Trees toppled and sank into the ground. Swaths of forest land subsided; drowned trees left a conspicuous reminder of the quake damage for decades. Land slides moved down the valleys. The mass movement of large swaths of land reportedly moved a man’s well 20 yards from his house. The river bluffs collapsed into the water rendering boats moored near shore prone to being crushed. River islands and sand bars flowed away as the saturated sand “liquified” during the extended shaking. 

In the epicenter zones, rivers and streams changed courses, moving into newly sunken valleys or meandering around uplifts.  There was widespread flooding.

Hundreds of kilometers away, people in other states felt the swaying and some even became ill from the sensation. Doors swung open and closed. Windows rattled. 

Soil fissures

Fissuring of the surface was common and widespread. The dramatic claims about soil cracks included that they emitted steam, hissing, and swallowed people and livestock. The soil cracked as the surface waves moved past. Or the land surface down-faulted in narrow strips leaving scarps or troughs. Dramatic reports described the rolling land swells burst with water and sand (“bursting of the swells”), leaving fissures as the motion passed. This could be true or could be conflated with sand blows (see below). 

Contrary to claims and fears, the fissures were not bottomless and did not swallow people. There was no instance documented of a person falling into a crevasse and lost. Mostly they were only a few inches wide and shallow. The soil rifts filled up quickly with loose material and water, but the disruptions of the surface made travel by wagon far more difficult in the coming months. Many of the fissures were preserved by infilling of sand and later studied. The depth of the open fissures was typically a foot to several feet but no greater than 20 ft. 

Sand blows and extrusions

A surprising and violent behavior attributed to the quakes were sand blows – eruptions of loose sand and organic matter pushed to the surface forming round craters. The widespread sand blows occurred in low alluvial lands where the loose saturated sand from the subsurface was ejected upwards by the pressure of the shaking. 

Extrusions of the subsurface material were accompanied by loud explosions and whistling. The material was reported to be ejected up to 15 ft high. Along with the loose sediment came rotting vegetation, bits of coal, and occasional large fragments including part of the skull of an extinct musk ox. 

While some of the extrusions were propelled by gases or pressure, some soft sediments were squeezed out as the pressures readjusted. In places, the extrusions were more gentle as water suddenly flowed from the ground where there previously wasn’t a spring. Releases of water and gas continued as the subsurface pressures readjusted for a while after the quake.

The upwelling and movement of the soft saturated sediment almost certainly produced a “quicksand” situation in places where trees sunk into the ground. 

The sand blows remain noticeable today in New Madrid as a remnant of the great quakes. The sandy areas resist vegetation. Geologists excavate trenches looking for the feeder veins for sand blows that resemble small sand volcanoes. Sand dikes and sills buried below the surface can indicate past quake activity and can be dated to help understand the periodicity of quakes in an area. These data suggest the New Madrid seismic zone generates magnitude 7 to 8 earthquakes about every 500 years during the past 1,200 years.

Sulfur smell

The ground movement, fissuring, and sand blows emitted water vapor. Since the winter air was cold, the water coming up from the ground was comparatively warm creating a fog. The vapor that hung in the air after the quakes gave off a terrible smell, like sulfur. The bad air caused difficulty in breathing for some people. The smell was also apparent in the groundwater. Organic material buried in the sediment was churned up and released via the ground movement which accounted for the smell. The “sulfur springs” that continued to flow had high concentrations of oxidized sulfur-bearing minerals, such as pyrite. 

Mississippi River

The town of New Madrid in 1811 was located at a bend in the Mississippi River. The New Madrid seismic zone, a structurally weak, failed rift,  is a naturally low area where the river meanders through. 

There was heavy traffic on the Mississippi that December. The effects of the shaking were most dramatic along the river and in the soft sediments along the banks. Shaking caused the banks to collapse, taking entire trees into the churning current. The landslides into the water cause huge waves, some of which overtook the boats and their crews. Fish were thrown onto the banks. The current apparently quickened, probably because of the heaving river beds and huge waves. Sand extrusions from the river bottom itself propelled mud and debris upwards and created a “boiling” appearance to the water.  The churned-up river bottom mud turned the water murky and red. Sunken trees and other debris rose to the surface. Parts of the river channel were uplifted revealing tree stumps and shallow areas. Islands in the river disappeared as the saturated sediment turned into liquid sand that was washed away by the waves. 

The upward thrusts within the river bed not only created some temporary waterfalls (which were eroded soon after) but also may have led to what is the most enduring dramatic story about the New Madrid event – that the Mississippi River flowed backward. 

Did the river reverse direction?

This is a difficult question to answer, mostly because it’s a matter of definition and degrees. Clearly, the disruptions coming from below the surface and land slips into the water created chaos in the normal pattern of flow. The thrusts, fissures, and blows in the channel may have created a temporary “retrograde” or backward current where the water appeared to flow temporarily in the upstream direction. But this did not happen for more than a short period of time and only in short reaches. The claim that the river reversed direction has been heavily exaggerated. The river was also not sucked down into open chasms. The river bottom was heaved up in places with the uplifted water thrown around. The scene on the river was most certainly one of terrifying chaos.

Noise

A tremendous noise preceded large shocks by a second or two. The sounds of the quakes were described as roaring, rumbling, hissing, whistling, thunder, cannon sounds, or blowing. Local strong exploding noise came from the force of the sand and water extrusions.

Boats moored on the river heard rumbling described as if the boat bottom was hitting gravel while residents in their homes heard the groaning and creaking of their houses and rattling furniture.

Cities distant from New Madrid also heard rumbling like thunder with the approach of the seismic wave that increased as the shock passed through. 

Light

The stronger shocks were followed by black clouds or darkness from the “smoke”, “fog”, or “vapor” that took hours to clear. The darkness was likely dust from the land slides and collapsed structures. Water vapor released from the ground condensed in the cold winter atmosphere creating an “earthquake fog”.

One of the most mysterious and disputed claims related to the New Madrid quakes was from several reputable witnesses who saw lightning-like flashes and glows in the sky that directly accompanied the quakes. One person in New Madrid reported sparks emitted from the earth. (For more on earthquake lights, see this post.) William Pierce, who wrote letters to the New York Evening Post reporting back from his journey along the Mississippi said that “an electric flash ran along the surface tearing the earth to pieces in its progress”.

Flashes and a glowing sky were also seen from those in distant cities. The atmosphere was said to be luminous across the entire sky at night even though there was no moon. Red clouds were seen in South Carolina immediately before the Dec 16 quake. In North Carolina, people reported long-lasting sky glow that they thought was the result of large fires. Loud thunder accompanied the glow. A report from ships in the tropics noted aurora-like glows in the sky one night. Later, they correlated that observation to the time of a quake. Scientists historically dismissed these reports of lights by assuming they were related to the dust and water vapor emitted along the fault, thunderstorms, or regular atmospheric magnetic disturbances. But the curious possibility remains that earthquake lights may have manifested from the ground or in the atmosphere resulting from the fault movements. 

Animals

The boat crewmen reported watching as the trees on the shore swayed. The birds, they said, made a hasty retreat. In the animals’ confusion and panic, many landed on the boats, or even on people.  In the countryside, those riding horses when a shock was imminent were forewarned as the horses would stop and plant their feet seconds before the surface waves arrived. Wild animals reportedly came out of the woods into the farmyards, panting and terrified. Their fear of people was overwhelmed by the need to seek safety. Different kinds of animals were said to be huddling together in the open, disoriented and stressed. A few other accounts from distant towns noted that dogs could also perceive a coming quake. This is not strange because animals are typically more sensitive than people to the sounds and early indications that a seismic pulse is moving towards them. One incident that became connected to the quake but is almost certainly unrelated is that of a mass migration of squirrels noted months prior to the quakes. Such mass migrations had been noted before. There is no evidence to suggest that any animals moved out of the quake zone prior to the first movements.

People

The residents of New Madrid suffered greatly from the quake damage even though few died. The churches experienced a temporary influx of people labeled “earthquake Christians” as they sought a higher power to help them get through the constant shaking that rattled their foundations and their nerves. Rumors ran rampant. One was that the natives said the great quakes were due to the white settlers disturbing the land. There was a rumor that Tecumseh, the Shawnee warrior chief who resisted the new settlers issued a prophecy that the earth would shake. The accuracy of that prophecy is dubious.

An early popular idea was that the quakes were from volcanic activity. Volcanoes were better understood by the general population than faulting and earth movements. Unconfirmed accounts circulated that volcanoes existed nearby.  The violent “eruption” of so much material from the ground during the quake added to the thought that the event was volcanic.

A crime revealed by earthquake

In March, after the series of quakes, a dog pulled a skull out from the rubble of a house in Western Kentucky. The remains revealed the story of a slave named George who had been murdered by the Lewis brothers after he broke a water pitcher. The brothers attempted to burn George’s dismembered body but the first quake occurred that night causing the chimney to collapse. The subsequent quakes prevented the body from being burned, eventually leading to the discovery of the crime by neighbors who noticed George was missing. 

New Madrid today

After revisiting New Madrid’s historic catastrophe, the most frightening realization we make is that millions of people live in or are traveling through the New Madrid Seismic Zone every day. There is a 7-10% chance that a magnitude 7.0 or greater event will occur in the next 50 years. The population is unprepared. They don’t know much of the actual history and are generally unaware this is an active seismic zone. The small magnitude quakes occur regularly but do not shake people up enough for them to worry about what might happen again. The tremendous effects reported over 200 years ago would be catastrophic in terms of lost lives and damage incurred today. Scientists continue to debate if the threat of future quakes is fading or if it will continue along the approximately 500-1000 yr cycle of activity. Meanwhile, the New Madrid town website repeats some of the extraordinary claims I mentioned, some of which are exaggerated.

Psychics and pseudoscientific prognosticators have plagued the town, most notably in 1990 when Iben Browning, a non-scientist, created a media frenzy by predicting a quake would occur in response to “tidal forces” on a given date – December 2 and 3. Nothing happened. Last month, a psychic “time traveler” predicted that “the Great Split” quake would occur here. It didn’t. Nonsense predictions circulating on social media sometimes gain traction. Most likely there will be no noticeable warning prior to the next big shake-up of towns along the New Madrid Seismic Zone. 

Bibliography

Bagnall, Norma H. 1996. On Shaky Ground: the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-1812. 

Fuller, Myron L. 1912. The New Madrid Earthquake, US Geological Survey, Bulletin 494.

Penick, James L.Jr. 1981. The New Madrid Earthquakes, Revised Edition. 

Valencius, Conevery Bolton. 2013. The Lost History of the New Madrid Earthquakes.

20 Cool Facts about the New Madrid Seismic Zone. US Geological Survey, General Information Product 134. 

#earthquakeLights #earthquakeNoise #earthquakes #NewMadrid #seismicZone

https://sharonahill.com/?p=2340

Earthquake Lights

Despite centuries of reports of anomalous luminous phenomena (ANP) – lights, glows, flames, sparks and clouds – before, during or after an earthquake, the scientific view of such reports remains deeply divided. The evidence for earthquake lights (EQLs) and associated anomalies consists overwhelmingly of anecdotal accounts. But scientific evidence has been accumulating, and in the past 10 years a plausible theory to explain the host of unusual precursors has been proposed. Geological reference sources fail to address the wide breadth of ideas within this topic, and mystery-themed sources contain mostly non-scholarly information that is dubious or exaggerated. A balanced view was needed. So, here is the Spooky Geology examination of the credibility and cause of earthquake lights and associated ANP.

Quebec, Canada, 25 November 1988, 18:46 local time.
It was dark when Joseph Dallaire, a trapper in Laterriere, was leaving the conifer forest after checking the traps near his home. The weather was mostly clear and cold with a low wind. After exiting the woods, he headed to his house across the open field 700 meters away when he was startled by a crackling sound approaching from behind. This sound was followed by a 6-15 m high curtain of bluish light that passed by him in about 2 seconds. Then he felt the shaking from the magnitude 6.5 earthquake which had occurred in Saguenay 19 km away. Dallaire described the light to a researcher as hugging the ground as it moved past him, passing into the open field, and disappearing to the northwest. He reported that the light was bright enough to illuminate his house. It was not like normal lightning but the crackling sound suggested an electric field buildup and discharge off the tree branches. The curtain or sheet of light suggests a strong electric field from the ground that resulted in a discharge at the ground-to-air interface. The discharge was traveling away from the direction of the Saguenay quake epicenter. [1]

What can we make of this remarkable event? It was not the only luminous phenomenon noted in association with this unusual quake that took place within the continental land mass, far from a plate boundary. At 29 km depth, it produced strong shaking but few aftershocks indicating a distinct release of energy. The Saguenay earthquake lights were relatively well-studied [2] yet we still have a mystery regarding the Dallaire experience.

The topic of earthquake lights is both highly technical and popular with lay audiences, making it difficult to discuss in popular discourse. This is not a unique problem as it occurs in most scientific fields. With most Spooky Geology subjects, there exists a popular idea about the phenomena but the detailed scientific ideas are buried within the specialized literature of various subjects. For EQLs, we can find snippets and threads of the discussion in natural history, geology, geophysics, rock mechanics, and seismology, but also in folklore, psychology, and cultural studies. What typically is supplied to the public from mainstream news and entertainment sources is nontechnical, unchecked, and often exaggerated or wrong.

Scientific journals and reliable media reports hold a wealth of observations and reports of EQLs. Often thought of as folklore, there are many highly technical explanations suggested by qualified experts, not cranks or wacky amateurs. Those interested in strange phenomena likely are not aware of the current state of thinking on the topic so let’s assess the big questions: Is there something here to explain? And what are some reasonable means to explain it? What does the scientific community think in comparison to the public? Could mainstream seismology be missing something or are EQLs all misperceptions or misinterpretations of other things?

Earth Lights

Lights originating from the earth (not the sky) have been reported for millennia. [3] “Earth lights” is a term that encompasses several reported but still questionable phenomena frequently associated with paranormal and fringe ideas. Many places are noted for recurring observations of slow-moving or stationary balls of light with no apparent source – Hessdalen valley in Norway and Brown Mountain Lights in North Carolina. These phenomena have been related to seismic stresses or geochemical processes that generate electric fields. Mysterious balls of light called “spook lights” or “ghost lights” are known from many locations. While these may be at least partially explained by atmospheric conditions that produce refraction of man-made lights from cars, trains, or planes, some have been reported long before modern transportation. Ball lightning, while related to storm events, seems to come from a ground interaction with typical lightning and is reported by witnesses to behave very strangely. Both ball lightning and spook lights are sometimes described as acting “intelligent” – moving away as people get closer or following cars. Earth lights as genuine natural phenomena are controversial for reasons I’ll explain further on. Reports of near-earth lights obviously cross over with descriptions of UFOs. The Condon Report, the US government’s final word on UFOs in 1969, explained some reported UFOs as natural luminous phenomena – that is, it invoked a mystery to attempt to explain another mystery. [4]

Seismic-related lights

Lights in association with seismic activity were reported before today’s modern electrified cities existed. They are also reported over the ocean or as luminous balls in the water. Galli, an Italian priest, published 148 observations recorded from 89 BC to 1910 in Europe. [5] Montandon developed a system in 1948 to categorize lights [2]. Types of ANP include the following:

• Flashes or sheet lightning that illuminates the sky
• Slow-moving globes or floating balls of light
• Bands or rays in the sky, or columns emanating from the ground
• Small or tall flames from the ground that shimmer
• Diffuse glows usually over mountains.

But that’s not all, as the Daillaire event showed. Sparks and electricity crackling on high points have been noted, sometimes related to radio interference as happens during lightning strikes during a rainstorm. [2, 4, 6]

EQLs of these various types have been reported before, during, or shortly after the shaking, mostly related to quakes above magnitude 5. They are witnessed seconds or weeks prior and last seconds to minutes in duration. One researcher estimate they may occur only in association with 5-6% of all quakes. So they are not common. [5]

Key Observations

In 1968, a swarm of quakes occurred that were pivotal to the history of EQLs called the Matsushiro events. Mr. Kuribayashi, a dentist, took a series of photos in succession, showing a sustained hemispherical glow over Mt. Kimyo in Japan, lasting about 90 seconds, and then the glow diminished. Other glows associated with the same event lasted from 10 seconds to 2 minutes. John Derr of the US geological survey was a proponent of EQL in the 70s. He considered these photographs, brought to the public by Yasui (of the Kakioka magnetic observatory in Ibaraki) as the best evidence for EQL we had so far. Yasui also noted what’s called “sferics” – radio interference in 10-20 kHz range – associated with some earthquakes. [4]

On July 1, in either 1972 or 1973 (for an explanation of this discrepancy, see [5 – electronic supplement]) visitor Jim Conacher photographed seven luminous globes on Lime mountain near Taglish Lake, Yukon, Canada. He thought he was seeing UFOs. These slow-moving orbs, also called “slow meteors”, are typical of globular EQLs that travel in curious paths, not like a solid object exhibiting ballistic motion. The Cross Sound earthquake M=6.7 occurred on the suspected date of the photo. The orbs reportedly drifted upwards and there were no known causes for lights to appear there. [5]

The following dramatic and spooky photo depicts a flame-like version of EQLs. Not widely circulated, this spectral photo from Brasov, Romania is said to have been taken 100 km from a M= 7.4 epicenter quake in the Vrancea Mtns in 1977. Damage and loss of life occurred in Bucharest resulting from vertical slip of a thrust fault. [5 – elec. supplement]. Edit: According to Derr (personal communication), this photo may be a result of a camera malfunction).

Old Chinese folklore tales tell of clouds that looked like dragons appearing in the sky as a signal of a coming quake. Iridescent clouds are featured in a video taken about 30 minutes before the Sichuan/Wenchuan quake of May 12, 2008. The rainbow effect of these clouds is the result of small ice crystals or water droplets acting like a prism, diffracting or scattering light.

Skeptics argue that these clouds are neither earthquake lights nor particularly anomalous and are not related to the quake at all. But the observers found it to be remarkable enough to film it, so it was unusual. Ground-based electromagnetic seismic precursor observations have been employed in China for 40 years. For this 2008 quake, equipment recorded different anomalies near the epicenter of this quake from those of the outlying areas 300 km away. Researchers speculated that the difference could be explained by the different stress regimes – compressional vs extensional as the fault stressed a large area of crust. The electromagnetic emissions were three orders of magnitude higher than normal background. Ionosondes in the upper atmosphere recorded a giant positive (charge) disturbance in the ionosphere on May 9, three days before the quake. [7]

Other anomalous phenomena

Besides lights, there are other phenomena associated with earthquake precursors. As with lights, they are diverse with none being systematic or reliable in occurrence.

During the preparation time for a quake, rocks dilate and compress, opening and closing the tiny spaces within the rock. The opening, then squeezing, affects the water and gas in the rock spaces. We, therefore, see changes in the levels of groundwater and radon gas released in response to seismic events. Groundwater changes in wells and springs are commonly reported. This is not controversial. Even as the energy from a strong quake passes around the world, scientists recorded a small but significant effect on groundwater levels. Nearer to the fault, there may be extraordinary changes including temporary artesian effects, the appearance of new springs, or permanent changes in groundwater flow patterns. [8, 9]

Gas release (into air or water) is also not disputed. Radon release can be measured locally several times above the average concentration in the lead-up time to a large quake. Radon is radioactive and ionized the air, but not enough to generate electric currents to explain EQLs. [10] In Kobe, Japan, 1995, radon increased for several months before the main shock, peaking nine days prior at 10x normal concentrations. Radon emissions as earthquake precursors are a focus for Japanese researchers [11, 12] and were highly controversial in the L’Aquila, Italy event in 2009.

Several incidences of radio frequency pulses and anomalies, in the ULF and ELF ranges, have been recorded and later connected to a seismic event. In Loma Prieta, CA, 1989, magnetometers put in place by Stanford University for another purpose recorded a 20x increase in ULF energy 14 days prior to the main shock. [13, 14, 17] In Chile, 1960, an unusual radio event occurred 5 days prior to a large quake. It was recorded via four receivers monitoring solar activity. At the time, the cause was a mystery and the subject of a paper in 1963. Much later, that same researcher correlated the anomaly to the quake and wrote an update in 1982. [15] Unfortunately, this network never again caught a similar event. When very low-frequency anomalies were detected on the San Andreas fault in the 80s, scientists thought this type of monitoring looked promising for prediction. Further studies into the predictive nature of these signals were not so promising and interest waned. [16]

Related to the radio frequency anomalies is the concept of ionospheric coupling. Sergey Pulinets in Russia developed the idea of seismo-ionospheric coupling in the 1990s. [12] He explored the connection between earthquakes over magnitude 5 that sometimes were preceded by anomalies in the ionosphere. The ionosphere is the part of Earth’s upper atmosphere from about 60 to 1,000 km altitude that is ionized by solar and cosmic rays, but reflects radio waves. Russian and Chinese scientists are actively working on gaining more data on this using remote sensing via satellites. Some experiments measuring the ionosphere found a change in total electron content in the general area over the preparation region of a quake. [10, 12, 15, 18] The anomalies, noted a day, to weeks, to months ahead, are suspected to result from a stream of positive charges released from the ground surface in relation to increased stress from the fault, thus changing the electrodynamic properties of the atmosphere. Though it sounds obvious to look for anomalies such as these, it is difficult to pinpoint them because of regular fluctuations in the ionosphere from solar events and other normal causes of disturbance. Not all faults would even produce this signal (especially those underwater). [19]

Surface thermal anomalies have also been spotted via satellite some 100-500 km across a few days before major events. [13] An example included a 2001 quake in Bhuj, India (magnitude 7.9) where infrared emission was spotted several days before. [24] Thermal anomalies fluctuate and disappear and can cause an increase in apparent ground temps. That is, people on the ground report feeling a rise in air temperature but it is not reflected in the recorded local ground temp. [6, 7, 10, 11]

Several other atmospheric anomalies are associated with anecdotal reports prior to earthquakes including fog and strange clouds. Pliny the Elder and Aristotle considered strange clouds as EQ precursors and the belief is still held and reinforced by the “rainbow cloud” reports. [28] The idea of “earthquake weather” is a weak claim. Some local folklore claims the weather gets humid or rainy before a quake, which is consistent with the idea of electrical charge release that ionizes the air and can cause aerosols or nucleation of water vapor and rain. Rain before quakes has led to a mistaken belief that rain “lubricates” a fault. It doesn’t. But some have a local belief that hot and dry weather is indicative of a coming quake. That appears to be a myth since there is no correlation. If there is little moisture in the air but electrically charged particles are flowing out of the ground, then sparks or coronal discharges could be possible from pointed or irregularly shaped objects (also known as St. Elmo’s fire). Recall that a crackling sound preceded Dallaire’s view of the light curtain that came from the trees…

Biological anomalies are legendary when it comes to earthquake prediction. [20, 28] There are myriad tales of animals behaving strangely for days, weeks, or, most often, seconds before shaking is felt. Separate mechanisms are likely involved as animals can certainly detect tiny shaking, low-frequency vibrations or minute signals of the shaking seconds sooner than people. It’s the longer lead time reports that are curious and historically examined as a basis for warning systems. There are some lab data on this but it’s not robust [28]. The idea persists because of post hoc anecdotes. Animal reports from the affected areas are problematic due to the lack of controls for the observations. They are also unreliable due to suggestion and memory contamination because they are described after a stressful event. However, fish and small mammals are sensitive to electrical signals, so if a mechanism is found that produces such signals, it’s reasonable to attribute some anomalous animal behavior to this condition.

There are even reports of plants and trees looking unusual prior to a quake and of people feeling uneasy or ill. [28] From the few studies that exist, there is just not a decent body of evidence to go on.

Other spooky things have been reported in homes. Magnets temporarily seem to “demagnetize” hours before a quake. Radio and TV static is noted, and electronic devices and appliances malfunction. [28] Magnetic field anomalies have been recorded in conjunction with a quake. For the Loma Prieta, California event in 1989, an elevated signal was recorded through a network of devices two weeks prior and a very high signal three hours before. [13, 33] But the instrumentation lost power during the quake itself so there could be no follow-through to check what happened post-quake.

Many of the notable historical reports of lights and other anomalies pre-quake occur in continental areas not near subduction zones in areas where there is a type of extensional faulted area called a “graben”. [5] The earliest reports are vague with later reports being less so but still uncertain in detail.

New Madrid, Mississippi, 1811
This historic quake took place on the Mississippi River graben in an area of America sparsely populated at the time. An incredible 40,000 square miles of land was affected by the estimated ~7.9 magnitude quake. Luminous phenomena appeared in the epicentral area including sparks from the earth, exploding flashes and sheet lightning in the sky, but up to 600 km away, people also saw flashes and a glowing sky like “fires in the air”. [5 – electronic suppl., 21] See Spooky Events from the New Madrid Quake.

Lisbon, Portugal, 1755
8 days prior to this tremendous quake, worms appeared all over the ground. Other unusual animal behaviors, strange lightning and flames from the mountainside were also observed. [22]

Sonora, Mexico, 1887
The 7.2 magnitude quake was very strong for this area and fault movement extended into Arizona. People thought volcanoes were erupting as they observed blazing craters in the mountains. Scientists discovered scorched trees over the fault line. [4]

Idu peninsula, Japan, 1930
1500 reports of luminous phenomena were associated with this quake that occurred at 4:30 am. Carefully recorded eyewitness reports included descriptions of the sky lit up by fireballs and beams and columns of light. A series of round lights in a straight line were seen moving through the sky. [4]

Haicheng, China, 1975
This was a most remarkable event that began in December of 1974 when unusual animal behavior was noted by trained observers. Snakes came out of hibernation and froze on the ground, rats acted confused, chickens and cattle were excitable. In addition, the groundwater table changed, artesian wells appeared, springs became cloudy, and gas bubbles appeared in ponds. Many small quakes occurred but by February, reports of anomalies climbed steeply in number. Ground fog was noted as near-surface humidity increased. On February 4, an evacuation of the town was ordered. Then, at 7:36 pm a 7.3 magnitude quake occurred. The evacuation was credited with saving thousands of lives saved. [23, 20]

Tangshan, China, 1976
Fireballs and flashes were seen 200 miles away from the area where the next night a 7.8 magnitude occurred. 240,000 people were killed (or more). Changes to ground resistivity changes were recorded and there were some reports of fish acting strangely. [22]

Saguenay, Quebec, Canada, 1988
46 good reports of luminous phenomena were collected during this swarm of 67 quakes: light balls floating a meter off the ground, motionless “meteors” (some with streamers) popping out of the ground, rays and bands across the sky. The main shock of 5.9 magnitude produced the Dallaire account of a crackling light curtain. Observation of the lights was found to be correlated to location of grabens. [2,7]

Kobe, Japan, 1995
Seconds before the magnitude 7.2 quake, blue-white streaks were observed from the fault area. The longest lasted more than 30 seconds. White luminous hemispheres 100-200m wide appeared near the ground and floated upwards. Flashes appeared at the same time as the shaking, even on the little-industrialized island of Awaji. At the surface exposure of the fault, plant roots were found scorched, the minerals had been locally heated high enough to melt silicates in the rock. [25, 26]

There are many other similar events associated with anomalies in the historic literature including several reports from sailors who described glowing balls that rise from the ocean depths and burst on the surface and discs of lighted water. Speculation as to the cause of these anomalies include the electrolysis of seawater or response to environmental stimuli by self-luminescent animals. [8]

Modern strong quakes get significant media attention. Events are recorded via security cameras and mobile phones and distributed on social media. Recording of lights, strange clouds, glows, and flashes are the subject of YouTube and Facebook videos prompting interest in the idea of EQLs.

Fidani [6] published a study of observations from L’Aquila Italy in 2010. After several foreshocks, a magnitude 6.3 event occurred in April 2009. Eyewitness interviews resulted in collection of 241 reports of luminous phenomena but 1057 anomalies in total. Locals reported flames emanating from the ground after the main shock 10 m high and small flickers from poles and between the cobblestones just prior to the main shock. The sky glowed red or orange before the quake, with violet clouds and fog, especially over the mountains. Sparks came off rough or pointed surfaces. 71 flashes were cataloged before and during the main shock from a clear sky. Fireballs, glows, and streamers similar to an aurora appeared above. Radio phenomena and unusual sounds were also noted. 305 biological observations were logged including that of a biologist who noted that the toads she was studying disappeared. after several foreshocks. [27] Giampaolo Giuliani was an amateur researcher making radon measurements. He made an unofficial prediction based on his measurements but he was cited by government officials for making dangerous public pronouncements and silenced.

Carlo Strinella, a resident near L’Aquila, already heard of EQLs. When he saw flashes, he took his family out of the house. Here is an account taken from Fidani:

“At about 01:30 on 6 April, just two hours before the main shock, Carlo Strinella saw two white light flashes reflected on the furniture of the kitchen, whose shutter was open. The second flash was intense as daylight, lasted more than 1 s, and was left impressed on his retinas. He checked that everything was fine in the kitchen, and looked out the window but saw the stars, and did not hear thunder. Then, he remembered having read an EQL summary a few months earlier and decided to take his family to a safer structure. He also noticed that the air temperature outside had sensibly warmed up during the night in comparison with the feeling he had immediately after dinner time, at about 21:00.” [6]

L’Aquila reports of anomalies span a wide spectrum. But the Fidani survey was done after the event when the researcher declared one of his aims was to instruct the public about EQLs, so we must be careful about taking these anecdotes at face value. Other than the glowing skies, I can find no other physical evidence recorded. Radon, EM frequencies, groundwater levels and infrared anomalies are measurable. If changes in these parameters did occur, anomalies could be recorded.

Three recent events have increased public interest in EQLs.

Lima, Peru, 2007
Security cameras caught light flashes as the shear waves passed from a magnitude 8 quake. A Navy officer reported blue columns of light bursting four times in succession from rocky outcrops in shallow water between his ship and the shore. [7]

Kaikoura, New Zealand, 2016
This 7.8M event occurred at night. Several people recorded green and blue flashes in the sky. These were said to be over the sea but that is not clear.

Mexico City, Mexico, 2017
Several light flashes in the distance were recorded from surveillance cameras.

Acapulco, Mexico, 2021
Like the Mexico City quake of 2017, people caught on camera flashes in the sky minutes after the quake. This is significant because electrical transformers and wiring were clearly disrupted, and the sky was cloudy to reflect the light. In addition, there were apparently thunderstorms in the area. This event created a flurry of interest in EQL based on a misunderstanding: people assumed the flashes were either a result of the fault break or that all flashes, regardless of cause, should be referred to as EQLs.

All four of these events were called “EQLs” but they are questionable. The flashes look conspicuously like electricity transformers exploding or arcing as electrical wires touch. This produces very bright white-blue light that can be reflected by clouds. (Perhaps even the Matsushiro photo could be an electric transformer.) It’s more plausible that this is the explanation for these lights because we know this happens during large quakes in urban areas.

Frustratingly, we have not seen recorded the more unusual forms of EQLs like ground flames, fireballs, sparks and columns. Light pollution, large swaths of paved areas, and lack of connection with the natural state of the land may mean that subtle natural anomalies are masked or that we don’t notice environmental changes as we did in the past.

Scientific Skepticism

The scientific/seismological view of EQLs remains one of skepticism, for good reason. Science is inherently conservative in changing to a new paradigm. Enough trustworthy evidence must be accumulated for the shift to occur and often various social factors make it happen even more slowly. Most of the evidence for EQLs is anecdotal – the worst kind of scientific evidence. Anecdotes can lead you where to look but they contain noise and errors. How would scientists credibly record these observations? Earthquakes happen all over the world and in indeterminate time frames. To set up observations for EQLs and associated precursors, the scale and scope are huge. [13] There are multiple variables that need to be measured and coverage in time and space must be adequate. [1] Even in the situation of known seismically active areas, this is often prohibitively expensive. Not all faults will produce precursors as subsurface regimes are different, even from one quake to another. Perhaps atmospheric conditions could have an effect on perceiving precursors. Since they clearly are not reliable to the extent that we can readily distinguish them, we can conclude they are more of an exception rather than usual. The lack of a plausible mechanism inhibits research. If we don’t have some idea how they COULD be, it is more difficult to plan to catch them.

Finally, scientists are skeptical because not much progress has been made due to the above problems. EQLs fall into the realm of legend and myth and have been lumped into paranormal subject areas like UFOs, ghost lights, and poltergeist activity. Many claims of EQLs seem to be explainable by other causes such as post hoc claims being inaccurate due to stress or misinterpretation, asserting undue meaning to non-associated events (such as iridescent clouds and animal behavior), and alternative coincidental causes such as electrical arcs or regular fires as a result of quakes.

Traditional research in seismology has been focused on mechanical observations – ground deformation, and prior events. [11] Because the reported precursors are very diverse, it’s hard to fathom whether they have the same mechanism. Besides that, we don’t know what the mechanism could be.

The “father of seismology” Robert Mallet talked about EQLs back in the 1850s in his volumes On the Facts of Earthquake Phenomenon. [7] In 1931, 1500 reports existed, collected by professional researchers. Some said at that time there was no doubt they exist. [1] Again in 1973, John Derr of the USGS called them “well established” based on the many documented reports. [4] Several scientists publishing on these topics repeatedly state that EQLs are accepted to exist. This is curious because they remain notably controversial in the bigger geological framing.

USGS page on EQL:

“Geophysicists differ on the extent to which they think that individual reports of unusual lighting near the time and epicenter of an earthquake actually represent EQL:  some doubt that any of the reports constitute solid evidence for EQL, whereas others think that at least some reports plausibly correspond to EQL.”

Proposed mechanisms

Various mechanisms have been proposed to explain EQLs. But, how does the charge get to the surface? If we confirm the occurrence of the charge at the surface, then there is a basis for the reports and they will be greater acceptance. A mechanism that produces air ionization, where electrically charged particles also act as nuclei for condensation and release latent heat, could be at play. Air ionization could possibly produce coronal discharges, sparks, plasma emissions, effects on animals, fog and clouds, and electromagnetic anomalies. The mechanism derived from fault stress must be able to concentrate and maintain large charge densities to reach the surface and release it. Charge accumulation and movement are a problem. [19] Plate tectonics results in squeezing, grinding, and breaking rock slabs and mineral grains on a huge scale. It would be surprising if you don’t get something electrical going on. Several mechanisms to account for EQL and associated phenomena have been proposed:

• Streaming potential. Fluids forced through small pathways generate electrical charges. This does not seem to produce high enough voltage. [11]
• Piezoelectricity. [11] Some minerals like quartz which is abundant produce an electric charge when pressure is applied. This is a favored idea regarding EQLs, however, this happens in a short span and decays quickly as the + and – charges cancel out due to random distribution of crystals. [23] Though it can be associated with radio frequency emission, there seems no way to concentrate the charges and them get them to the surface.
• Vaporization in shear zone. High stresses in the fault zone can produce charge separation and dramatically increase conductivity. Once again, this only works if the path to the surface is short where it may produce a coronal discharge above the fault. Several variables are also at play: amount of water available, width of shear zone, sliding velocity, the breakage of rock (as in a new fault), and the level of stress buildup. [23]
• Sono luminescence. [30] An intense sound wave can cause gas bubbles in liquid to collapse producing a burst of light. What if the same happens with an intense seismic wave? This idea didn’t go very far as it does not account for reports of light beforehand and the effect must occur close to the surface.

All these processes may be going on but none seem to be able to produce what is observed as EQLs on a large scale.

Peroxy defect theory

The current leading candidate for a mechanism is that of the peroxy defect theory. Friedemann Freund is the discoverer and primary promoter of this unifying theory – combining ideas from semi-conductor physics, chemistry, and rock physics into this framework to explain the generation, concentration and movement of a charge cloud to the surface. In simplified terms, the idea is this: There is a percentage of “peroxy defects” in the minerals that make up igneous and metamorphic rocks. The defects in the molecular structure occur when the oxygen molecules are not in their typical valence state but connected by a weak oxygen-oxygen single bond. Under stress, these bonds break and release positive charge carriers, called positive holes (P-holes), which flow via grain-to-grain contact in the rock. They move fast (200 m/s) and far (several km). The cloud of charged particles moves from high to low stress and upon reaching the surface, the theory goes, the cloud can generate local electrical fields that produce massive air ionization causing coronal discharges or bursts of light. Freund concludes this is what generates the necessary charge for the observed EQL effects and associated phenomena. He has demonstrated the charge concentration and movement in the lab on a small scale by stressing rocks. He reports that at around 2 seconds before the rock slab fails, a burst of positive ions is released from the surface of lower stress. The stress gradient drives the movement of the charge. The flow is away from the fault and, notably, to high points like mountains or asperities (areas of rough surface or points). Pointed and irregular structures produce a higher potential gradient and are more prone to emit the corona discharge. Peroxys are not very controversial but this idea to explain EQLs and precursors has not received much attention from seismologists (who are mostly trained in geophysics, not solid-state physics or chemistry). [1,5,10,11]

The peroxy defect theory has its problems – an obvious one being how to test it. We can’t assume that lab results of stressed rock slabs are equivalent to underground conditions. Real-world conditions may be far more heterogeneous and not conform to the ideal conditions that would allow the formation of currents. Freund notes that charge flow may be focused in some areas and blocked in others due to the heterogeneity of the crust. If valid, however, this theory could account for lights of various kinds, fog, clouds, thermal infrared anomalies, ionospheric perturbations, animal behavior, and even strange everyday anomalies because of the cloud of electrically charged particles leaving the ground surface en masse. Perhaps the passing of shear waves may also produce forces that activate the peroxy defects, which may explain Dallaire’s event.

Spookiness

But it’s still just proposed. Dr. Freund and colleagues are having a difficult time getting a forum with today’s seismologists who, generally, still do not consider EQLs and other precursor reports to be important or meaningful. Scientific data gathered so far in support of EQ anomalies was often lucky observations or anecdotes. There are no statistically meaningful data sets yet. Even though some may recognize widely reported anomalous precursors as an unsolved problem, these observations don’t yet fit into the picture, therefore, mainstream seismology efforts are not geared toward supporting an investigation into it. The non-interest in precursor research may be associated with the geological conditions of the U.S. Earthquake precursors such as EQLs are not as prevalent in the U.S. –  90% of such reports are in rift areas in other parts of the world (though several oddities have been reported in modern times in California including Monterey Bay, Hollister, and Santa Rosa). [5 – elec. supplement] Most papers published on anomalous precursors are not in English but are from China, India, Russia, Taiwan and Japan. And finally, the idea of EQLs is tainted by its association with spooky things.

The tectonic strain theory is popular with paranormalists who wish to explain ghosts and hauntings by a localized, natural mechanism. [29] Michael Persinger is a neuroscientist who proposed that fault areas produce stress-induced, transient geophysical fields. Even when no quake occurs, these fields may affect the temporal lobe of the brain which could explain why people report lights and bad feelings, possibly have hallucinations, and experience strange electrical malfunctions making a house appear “haunted”. The data is not robust and additional investigation into the TST petered out.

Strange lights before catastrophes have a folkloric connotation of being “fire from heaven,” “the opening of Hell,” and are associated with superstition and bad omens. During a stressful time, people report weird events and exaggerate or get confused about what they saw which is why anecdotes surrounding earthquakes may be unreliable.

As mentioned previously, earth lights including EQLs overlap with reports of UFOs and spook lights. The association with paranormal or supernatural beliefs means several scientists will steer clear of such anomalies. The paranormal taint may also prevent reputable investigation into these observations which deserve some attention. Note how seriously the public takes reports of strange lights and how most scientists will brush these concerns away as mistakes. People will still seek out information, and if there are no reasonable explanations provided, the public (and media) will pick up on non-reputable explanations. Considering all this, changing scientists’ perception of EQLs is a tough goal.

Establishing the validity of EQLs

The first task to establish the validity of EQLs is to get more reliable data to build the case that they are feasible. There is a lack of facilities to record EQLs or other environmental anomalies. There is insufficient instrumentation to cover large areas for the various parameters that could be measured. Systems designed to detect anomalous fields must be able to distinguish normal fluctuations from anomalies that may be precursors. Quakefinder in Palo Alto, who works in association with Dr. Freund, is a private venture deploying magnetometers. Their goal is to get those large data sets, look for statistical significance, obtain calibrated local background measurements, and get past the anecdotes.

Much related work is going on in earnest in other countries. Cooperation is necessary. Bigger, more robust data sets, and subsequently better results can help bring additional resolution to the picture of all that may happen prior to a quake. Other countries and scientists of other disciplines are moving down this path of exploration.

In conclusion, there is much we don’t yet know about what happens prior to earthquakes. If precursors exist, they can be used to provide some warning – if not perfectly reliable in all cases. Reports of EQLs will remain unconvincing to scientists (but a fascination to the media and public) until more credible evidence is produced. The uncritical and unsophisticated promotion of EQL phenomena on the internet will lead to additional hoaxes and misidentification, making the subject more muddled. Other related observations such as ionospheric anomalies, electromagnetic anomalies, radio frequency interference, infrared anomalies, groundwater changes, and increased radon emissions also need more robust data sets and analysis. There’s a lot of work to do and it’s costly in terms of money, time, and effort.

Mainstream seismologists may be looking in the wrong place or not looking at all for those whispers from the earth that tell us something is about to happen. I’m excited about what will happen with this field of research in the future. Perhaps the next big quake will bring more convincing evidence that mysterious and spooky EQLs are genuine warning beacons that we should watch for and heed.

See me give this talk at the Goddard Scientific Colloquium on March 28, 2018.

References

1. St-Laurent, F., Derr, J.S., & Freund, F.T. (2006). Earthquake lights and the stress-activation of positive hole charge carriers in rocks. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth. 31, 305-312.

2. St-Laurent, F. (2000). The Saguenay, Quebec, Earthquake Lights of November 1988-January 1989: A Comparative Study with Reference to the Geo-atmospheric Lights Classification Proposed by Montandon in 1948 and Description Put Forward by Yasui in 1968. Seismological Research Letters. 71:2, 160-174

3. Deveraux, P. (1990). Earth Lights Revelation: Ufo’s and Mystery Lightform Phenomena: The Earth’s Secret Energy Force. Sterling Pub Co Inc.

4. Derr, J.S. (1973). Earthquake Lights: A Review of Observations and Present Theories. Bull of the Seismological Soc of Am. 63:6, 2177-2187.

5. Theirault, R., St-Laurent, F., Freund, F.T., & Derr, J.S. (2014). Prevalence of Earthquake Lights Associated with Rift Environments Seismological Research Letters 85:1, 159-178 and electronic supplement.

6. Fidani, C. (2010). The earthquake lights (EQL) of the 6 April 2009 Aquila earthquake, in Central Italy. Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 10, 967–978.

7. Zhang, X., Shen, X., & Mioa, Y. (2012). Electromagnetic Anomalies around Wenchuan Earthquake and Their Relationship with Earthquake Preparation. Procedia Environmental Sciences. 12A, 693-701.

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11. Freund, F.T. , Ouillon, G., Scoville, J., & Sornette, D. (2018). Earthquake precursors in the light of peroxy defects theory: critical review of systematic observations. European Physical Journal, in press.

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and
Pulinets, S.A., & Boyarchuk, K. (2004). Ionospheric Precursors of Earthquakes. Springer-Verlag: Berlin Heidelberg.

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18. Chuo, Y.J., Chen, Y.I., Liu, J.Y., & Pulinets, S.A. (2001). Ionospheric foF2 Variations Prior to Strong Earthquakes in Taiwan Area. Adv. Space Res. 27, 6–7, 1305-1310.

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20. Tributsch, H. (1982). When the Snakes Awake: Animals and Earthquake Prediction. MIT Press: Cambridge MA.

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Mexico “earthquake lights” of 2021

An earthquake of magnitude 7.0 occurred 11 miles (17.7 km) northeast of Acapulco, Mexico on the evening of September 7, 2021. As usual, the event was followed by personal videos flooding social media showing people scrambling outside. The sky is full of light bursts. Quickly, the media reported that these were “earthquake lights” or “rare lightning” (as reported by Reuters).

In footage from Acapulco, the flashes start shortly after the ground starts shaking, illuminating previously darkened hills behind the ocean bay and at one point appearing to bathe buildings on the shoreline in bright light.

In Mexico City, panicked residents tried to keep their balance outside an apartment building while the sky flashed blue, white and pink, another video on social media showed.

Reuters news

The sources seemed to do a poor to nonexistent job of critically assessing this information and took the opinion that these flashes were unusual or natural. Maybe it’s because earthquake lights sound plausible and are a dramatic explanation for the flashes. But there are three specific reasons why we can reasonably conclude that these flashes were NOT earthquake lights. 1. They appear to be along the horizon, not high in the sky. 2. They occurred after the quake, sometimes minutes later. 3. They are not the typical and unique descriptions of earthquake lights as glows, balls, or unusual sparks, curtains or flames.

Instead, these flashes are almost certainly from arcing wires from electrical lines that are broken or touching each other. Or, they are electrical transformers that have been damaged and emitting flashes. They can also be normal lightning flashing. Due to most reports being in Spanish, I’m not readily able to tell if a thunderstorm was occurring but it is visibly raining in some news videos. So, a thunderstorm is also a possible explanation. If so, that event is unconnected to seismic activity.

A final point: it’s absurd to report on earthquake lights as if they are a regular occurrence. If they exist at all, they are very rare and our documented evidence for them is scant and questionable. Usually, the evidence is only eyewitness accounts. If these flashes were anomalous, and indicative of earthquake lights, that would be huge news. However, like other recent quakes that follow the same pattern of flashing lights immediately after shaking, we know these are not anomalies.

If people have recordings of pre-earthquake glows, lights, or other anomalous phenomena, I’d love to hear it. But so far, I see no evidence of earthquake lights in these post-quake videos. Do not assume that news sources, even normally reliable sources are scientifically informed on this niche subject. If the reports are simply repeating accounts that have someone’s personal opinions embedded in them, that’s not factual.

Disclaimer: All images are used for educational purposes. Inevitably, there will be errors in the above. Please contact the site owner with comments or corrections or leave a comment below. Comments are moderated.

More:

Earthquake lights (pseudoEQLs) video from India (2023)

Anomalous claims from Turkey-Syria earthquake 2023

Media hypes questionable “mysterious” earthquake lights in Morocco (2023)

#Canada #Spookygeology #earthLights #earthquakeLights #earthquakePrecursors #earthquakes #EQL #seismic

https://sharonahill.com/?p=692

Despite centuries of reports of anomalous luminous phenomena (ANP) – lights, glows, flames, sparks and clouds – before, during or after an earthquake, the scientific view of such reports remains deeply divided. The evidence for earthquake lights (EQLs) and associated anomalies consists overwhelmingly of anecdotal accounts. But scientific evidence has been accumulating, and in the past 10 years a plausible theory to explain the host of unusual precursors has been proposed. Geological reference sources fail to address the wide breadth of ideas within this topic, and mystery-themed sources contain mostly non-scholarly information that is dubious or exaggerated. A balanced view was needed. So, here is the Spooky Geology examination of the credibility and cause of earthquake lights and associated ANP.

Quebec, Canada, 25 November 1988, 18:46 local time.
It was dark when Joseph Dallaire, a trapper in Laterriere, was leaving the conifer forest after checking the traps near his home. The weather was mostly clear and cold with a low wind. After exiting the woods, he headed to his house across the open field 700 meters away when he was startled by a crackling sound approaching from behind. This sound was followed by a 6-15 m high curtain of bluish light that passed by him in about 2 seconds. Then he felt the shaking from the magnitude 6.5 earthquake which had occurred in Saguenay 19 km away. Dallaire described the light to a researcher as hugging the ground as it moved past him, passing into the open field, and disappearing to the northwest. He reported that the light was bright enough to illuminate his house. It was not like normal lightning but the crackling sound suggested an electric field buildup and discharge off the tree branches. The curtain or sheet of light suggests a strong electric field from the ground that resulted in a discharge at the ground-to-air interface. The discharge was traveling away from the direction of the Saguenay quake epicenter. [1]

What can we make of this remarkable event? It was not the only luminous phenomenon noted in association with this unusual quake that took place within the continental land mass, far from a plate boundary. At 29 km depth, it produced strong shaking but few aftershocks indicating a distinct release of energy. The Saguenay earthquake lights were relatively well-studied [2] yet we still have a mystery regarding the Dallaire experience.

The topic of earthquake lights is both highly technical and popular with lay audiences, making it difficult to discuss in popular discourse. This is not a unique problem as it occurs in most scientific fields. With most Spooky Geology subjects, there exists a popular idea about the phenomena but the detailed scientific ideas are buried within the specialized literature of various subjects. For EQLs, we can find snippets and threads of the discussion in natural history, geology, geophysics, rock mechanics, and seismology, but also in folklore, psychology, and cultural studies. What typically is supplied to the public from mainstream news and entertainment sources is nontechnical, unchecked, and often exaggerated or wrong.

Scientific journals and reliable media reports hold a wealth of observations and reports of EQLs. Often thought of as folklore, there are many highly technical explanations suggested by qualified experts, not cranks or wacky amateurs. Those interested in strange phenomena likely are not aware of the current state of thinking on the topic so let’s assess the big questions: Is there something here to explain? And what are some reasonable means to explain it? What does the scientific community think in comparison to the public? Could mainstream seismology be missing something or are EQLs all misperceptions or misinterpretations of other things?

Earth Lights

Lights originating from the earth (not the sky) have been reported for millennia. [3] “Earth lights” is a term that encompasses several reported but still questionable phenomena frequently associated with paranormal and fringe ideas. Many places are noted for recurring observations of slow-moving or stationary balls of light with no apparent source – Hessdalen valley in Norway and Brown Mountain Lights in North Carolina. These phenomena have been related to seismic stresses or geochemical processes that generate electric fields. Mysterious balls of light called “spook lights” or “ghost lights” are known from many locations. While these may be at least partially explained by atmospheric conditions that produce refraction of man-made lights from cars, trains, or planes, some have been reported long before modern transportation. Ball lightning, while related to storm events, seems to come from a ground interaction with typical lightning and is reported by witnesses to behave very strangely. Both ball lightning and spook lights are sometimes described as acting “intelligent” – moving away as people get closer or following cars. Earth lights as genuine natural phenomena are controversial for reasons I’ll explain further on. Reports of near-earth lights obviously cross over with descriptions of UFOs. The Condon Report, the US government’s final word on UFOs in 1969, explained some reported UFOs as natural luminous phenomena – that is, it invoked a mystery to attempt to explain another mystery. [4]

Seismic-related lights

Lights in association with seismic activity were reported before today’s modern electrified cities existed. They are also reported over the ocean or as luminous balls in the water. Galli, an Italian priest, published 148 observations recorded from 89 BC to 1910 in Europe. [5] Montandon developed a system in 1948 to categorize lights [2]. Types of ANP include the following:

• Flashes or sheet lightning that illuminates the sky
• Slow-moving globes or floating balls of light
• Bands or rays in the sky, or columns emanating from the ground
• Small or tall flames from the ground that shimmer
• Diffuse glows usually over mountains.

But that’s not all, as the Daillaire event showed. Sparks and electricity crackling on high points have been noted, sometimes related to radio interference as happens during lightning strikes during a rainstorm. [2, 4, 6]

EQLs of these various types have been reported before, during, or shortly after the shaking, mostly related to quakes above magnitude 5. They are witnessed seconds or weeks prior and last seconds to minutes in duration. One researcher estimate they may occur only in association with 5-6% of all quakes. So they are not common. [5]

Key Observations

In 1968, a swarm of quakes occurred that were pivotal to the history of EQLs called the Matsushiro events. Mr. Kuribayashi, a dentist, took a series of photos in succession, showing a sustained hemispherical glow over Mt. Kimyo in Japan, lasting about 90 seconds, and then the glow diminished. Other glows associated with the same event lasted from 10 seconds to 2 minutes. John Derr of the US geological survey was a proponent of EQL in the 70s. He considered these photographs, brought to the public by Yasui (of the Kakioka magnetic observatory in Ibaraki) as the best evidence for EQL we had so far. Yasui also noted what’s called “sferics” – radio interference in 10-20 kHz range – associated with some earthquakes. [4]

On July 1, in either 1972 or 1973 (for an explanation of this discrepancy, see [5 – electronic supplement]) visitor Jim Conacher photographed seven luminous globes on Lime mountain near Taglish Lake, Yukon, Canada. He thought he was seeing UFOs. These slow-moving orbs, also called “slow meteors”, are typical of globular EQLs that travel in curious paths, not like a solid object exhibiting ballistic motion. The Cross Sound earthquake M=6.7 occurred on the suspected date of the photo. The orbs reportedly drifted upwards and there were no known causes for lights to appear there. [5]

The following dramatic and spooky photo depicts a flame-like version of EQLs. Not widely circulated, this spectral photo from Brasov, Romania is said to have been taken 100 km from a M= 7.4 epicenter quake in the Vrancea Mtns in 1977. Damage and loss of life occurred in Bucharest resulting from vertical slip of a thrust fault. [5 – elec. supplement]. Edit: According to Derr (personal communication), this photo may be a result of a camera malfunction).

Old Chinese folklore tales tell of clouds that looked like dragons appearing in the sky as a signal of a coming quake. Iridescent clouds are featured in a video taken about 30 minutes before the Sichuan/Wenchuan quake of May 12, 2008. The rainbow effect of these clouds is the result of small ice crystals or water droplets acting like a prism, diffracting or scattering light.

Skeptics argue that these clouds are neither earthquake lights nor particularly anomalous and are not related to the quake at all. But the observers found it to be remarkable enough to film it, so it was unusual. Ground-based electromagnetic seismic precursor observations have been employed in China for 40 years. For this 2008 quake, equipment recorded different anomalies near the epicenter of this quake from those of the outlying areas 300 km away. Researchers speculated that the difference could be explained by the different stress regimes – compressional vs extensional as the fault stressed a large area of crust. The electromagnetic emissions were three orders of magnitude higher than normal background. Ionosondes in the upper atmosphere recorded a giant positive (charge) disturbance in the ionosphere on May 9, three days before the quake. [7]

Other anomalous phenomena

Besides lights, there are other phenomena associated with earthquake precursors. As with lights, they are diverse with none being systematic or reliable in occurrence.

During the preparation time for a quake, rocks dilate and compress, opening and closing the tiny spaces within the rock. The opening, then squeezing, affects the water and gas in the rock spaces. We, therefore, see changes in the levels of groundwater and radon gas released in response to seismic events. Groundwater changes in wells and springs are commonly reported. This is not controversial. Even as the energy from a strong quake passes around the world, scientists recorded a small but significant effect on groundwater levels. Nearer to the fault, there may be extraordinary changes including temporary artesian effects, the appearance of new springs, or permanent changes in groundwater flow patterns. [8, 9]

Gas release (into air or water) is also not disputed. Radon release can be measured locally several times above the average concentration in the lead-up time to a large quake. Radon is radioactive and ionized the air, but not enough to generate electric currents to explain EQLs. [10] In Kobe, Japan, 1995, radon increased for several months before the main shock, peaking nine days prior at 10x normal concentrations. Radon emissions as earthquake precursors are a focus for Japanese researchers [11, 12] and were highly controversial in the L’Aquila, Italy event in 2009.

Several incidences of radio frequency pulses and anomalies, in the ULF and ELF ranges, have been recorded and later connected to a seismic event. In Loma Prieta, CA, 1989, magnetometers put in place by Stanford University for another purpose recorded a 20x increase in ULF energy 14 days prior to the main shock. [13, 14, 17] In Chile, 1960, an unusual radio event occurred 5 days prior to a large quake. It was recorded via four receivers monitoring solar activity. At the time, the cause was a mystery and the subject of a paper in 1963. Much later, that same researcher correlated the anomaly to the quake and wrote an update in 1982. [15] Unfortunately, this network never again caught a similar event. When very low-frequency anomalies were detected on the San Andreas fault in the 80s, scientists thought this type of monitoring looked promising for prediction. Further studies into the predictive nature of these signals were not so promising and interest waned. [16]

Related to the radio frequency anomalies is the concept of ionospheric coupling. Sergey Pulinets in Russia developed the idea of seismo-ionospheric coupling in the 1990s. [12] He explored the connection between earthquakes over magnitude 5 that sometimes were preceded by anomalies in the ionosphere. The ionosphere is the part of Earth’s upper atmosphere from about 60 to 1,000 km altitude that is ionized by solar and cosmic rays, but reflects radio waves. Russian and Chinese scientists are actively working on gaining more data on this using remote sensing via satellites. Some experiments measuring the ionosphere found a change in total electron content in the general area over the preparation region of a quake. [10, 12, 15, 18] The anomalies, noted a day, to weeks, to months ahead, are suspected to result from a stream of positive charges released from the ground surface in relation to increased stress from the fault, thus changing the electrodynamic properties of the atmosphere. Though it sounds obvious to look for anomalies such as these, it is difficult to pinpoint them because of regular fluctuations in the ionosphere from solar events and other normal causes of disturbance. Not all faults would even produce this signal (especially those underwater). [19]

Surface thermal anomalies have also been spotted via satellite some 100-500 km across a few days before major events. [13] An example included a 2001 quake in Bhuj, India (magnitude 7.9) where infrared emission was spotted several days before. [24] Thermal anomalies fluctuate and disappear and can cause an increase in apparent ground temps. That is, people on the ground report feeling a rise in air temperature but it is not reflected in the recorded local ground temp. [6, 7, 10, 11]

Several other atmospheric anomalies are associated with anecdotal reports prior to earthquakes including fog and strange clouds. Pliny the Elder and Aristotle considered strange clouds as EQ precursors and the belief is still held and reinforced by the “rainbow cloud” reports. [28] The idea of “earthquake weather” is a weak claim. Some local folklore claims the weather gets humid or rainy before a quake, which is consistent with the idea of electrical charge release that ionizes the air and can cause aerosols or nucleation of water vapor and rain. Rain before quakes has led to a mistaken belief that rain “lubricates” a fault. It doesn’t. But some have a local belief that hot and dry weather is indicative of a coming quake. That appears to be a myth since there is no correlation. If there is little moisture in the air but electrically charged particles are flowing out of the ground, then sparks or coronal discharges could be possible from pointed or irregularly shaped objects (also known as St. Elmo’s fire). Recall that a crackling sound preceded Dallaire’s view of the light curtain that came from the trees…

Biological anomalies are legendary when it comes to earthquake prediction. [20, 28] There are myriad tales of animals behaving strangely for days, weeks, or, most often, seconds before shaking is felt. Separate mechanisms are likely involved as animals can certainly detect tiny shaking, low-frequency vibrations or minute signals of the shaking seconds sooner than people. It’s the longer lead time reports that are curious and historically examined as a basis for warning systems. There are some lab data on this but it’s not robust [28]. The idea persists because of post hoc anecdotes. Animal reports from the affected areas are problematic due to the lack of controls for the observations. They are also unreliable due to suggestion and memory contamination because they are described after a stressful event. However, fish and small mammals are sensitive to electrical signals, so if a mechanism is found that produces such signals, it’s reasonable to attribute some anomalous animal behavior to this condition.

There are even reports of plants and trees looking unusual prior to a quake and of people feeling uneasy or ill. [28] From the few studies that exist, there is just not a decent body of evidence to go on.

Other spooky things have been reported in homes. Magnets temporarily seem to “demagnetize” hours before a quake. Radio and TV static is noted, and electronic devices and appliances malfunction. [28] Magnetic field anomalies have been recorded in conjunction with a quake. For the Loma Prieta, California event in 1989, an elevated signal was recorded through a network of devices two weeks prior and a very high signal three hours before. [13, 33] But the instrumentation lost power during the quake itself so there could be no follow-through to check what happened post-quake.

Many of the notable historical reports of lights and other anomalies pre-quake occur in continental areas not near subduction zones in areas where there is a type of extensional faulted area called a “graben”. [5] The earliest reports are vague with later reports being less so but still uncertain in detail.

New Madrid, Mississippi, 1811
This historic quake took place on the Mississippi River graben in an area of America sparsely populated at the time. An incredible 40,000 square miles of land was affected by the estimated ~7.9 magnitude quake. Luminous phenomena appeared in the epicentral area including sparks from the earth, exploding flashes and sheet lightning in the sky, but up to 600 km away, people also saw flashes and a glowing sky like “fires in the air”. [5 – electronic suppl., 21] See Spooky Events from the New Madrid Quake.

Lisbon, Portugal, 1755
8 days prior to this tremendous quake, worms appeared all over the ground. Other unusual animal behaviors, strange lightning and flames from the mountainside were also observed. [22]

Sonora, Mexico, 1887
The 7.2 magnitude quake was very strong for this area and fault movement extended into Arizona. People thought volcanoes were erupting as they observed blazing craters in the mountains. Scientists discovered scorched trees over the fault line. [4]

Idu peninsula, Japan, 1930
1500 reports of luminous phenomena were associated with this quake that occurred at 4:30 am. Carefully recorded eyewitness reports included descriptions of the sky lit up by fireballs and beams and columns of light. A series of round lights in a straight line were seen moving through the sky. [4]

Haicheng, China, 1975
This was a most remarkable event that began in December of 1974 when unusual animal behavior was noted by trained observers. Snakes came out of hibernation and froze on the ground, rats acted confused, chickens and cattle were excitable. In addition, the groundwater table changed, artesian wells appeared, springs became cloudy, and gas bubbles appeared in ponds. Many small quakes occurred but by February, reports of anomalies climbed steeply in number. Ground fog was noted as near-surface humidity increased. On February 4, an evacuation of the town was ordered. Then, at 7:36 pm a 7.3 magnitude quake occurred. The evacuation was credited with saving thousands of lives saved. [23, 20]

Tangshan, China, 1976
Fireballs and flashes were seen 200 miles away from the area where the next night a 7.8 magnitude occurred. 240,000 people were killed (or more). Changes to ground resistivity changes were recorded and there were some reports of fish acting strangely. [22]

Saguenay, Quebec, Canada, 1988
46 good reports of luminous phenomena were collected during this swarm of 67 quakes: light balls floating a meter off the ground, motionless “meteors” (some with streamers) popping out of the ground, rays and bands across the sky. The main shock of 5.9 magnitude produced the Dallaire account of a crackling light curtain. Observation of the lights was found to be correlated to location of grabens. [2,7]

Kobe, Japan, 1995
Seconds before the magnitude 7.2 quake, blue-white streaks were observed from the fault area. The longest lasted more than 30 seconds. White luminous hemispheres 100-200m wide appeared near the ground and floated upwards. Flashes appeared at the same time as the shaking, even on the little-industrialized island of Awaji. At the surface exposure of the fault, plant roots were found scorched, the minerals had been locally heated high enough to melt silicates in the rock. [25, 26]

There are many other similar events associated with anomalies in the historic literature including several reports from sailors who described glowing balls that rise from the ocean depths and burst on the surface and discs of lighted water. Speculation as to the cause of these anomalies include the electrolysis of seawater or response to environmental stimuli by self-luminescent animals. [8]

Modern strong quakes get significant media attention. Events are recorded via security cameras and mobile phones and distributed on social media. Recording of lights, strange clouds, glows, and flashes are the subject of YouTube and Facebook videos prompting interest in the idea of EQLs.

Fidani [6] published a study of observations from L’Aquila Italy in 2010. After several foreshocks, a magnitude 6.3 event occurred in April 2009. Eyewitness interviews resulted in collection of 241 reports of luminous phenomena but 1057 anomalies in total. Locals reported flames emanating from the ground after the main shock 10 m high and small flickers from poles and between the cobblestones just prior to the main shock. The sky glowed red or orange before the quake, with violet clouds and fog, especially over the mountains. Sparks came off rough or pointed surfaces. 71 flashes were cataloged before and during the main shock from a clear sky. Fireballs, glows, and streamers similar to an aurora appeared above. Radio phenomena and unusual sounds were also noted. 305 biological observations were logged including that of a biologist who noted that the toads she was studying disappeared. after several foreshocks. [27] Giampaolo Giuliani was an amateur researcher making radon measurements. He made an unofficial prediction based on his measurements but he was cited by government officials for making dangerous public pronouncements and silenced.

Carlo Strinella, a resident near L’Aquila, already heard of EQLs. When he saw flashes, he took his family out of the house. Here is an account taken from Fidani:

“At about 01:30 on 6 April, just two hours before the main shock, Carlo Strinella saw two white light flashes reflected on the furniture of the kitchen, whose shutter was open. The second flash was intense as daylight, lasted more than 1 s, and was left impressed on his retinas. He checked that everything was fine in the kitchen, and looked out the window but saw the stars, and did not hear thunder. Then, he remembered having read an EQL summary a few months earlier and decided to take his family to a safer structure. He also noticed that the air temperature outside had sensibly warmed up during the night in comparison with the feeling he had immediately after dinner time, at about 21:00.” [6]

L’Aquila reports of anomalies span a wide spectrum. But the Fidani survey was done after the event when the researcher declared one of his aims was to instruct the public about EQLs, so we must be careful about taking these anecdotes at face value. Other than the glowing skies, I can find no other physical evidence recorded. Radon, EM frequencies, groundwater levels and infrared anomalies are measurable. If changes in these parameters did occur, anomalies could be recorded.

Three recent events have increased public interest in EQLs.

Lima, Peru, 2007
Security cameras caught light flashes as the shear waves passed from a magnitude 8 quake. A Navy officer reported blue columns of light bursting four times in succession from rocky outcrops in shallow water between his ship and the shore. [7]

Kaikoura, New Zealand, 2016
This 7.8M event occurred at night. Several people recorded green and blue flashes in the sky. These were said to be over the sea but that is not clear.

Mexico City, Mexico, 2017
Several light flashes in the distance were recorded from surveillance cameras.

Acapulco, Mexico, 2021
Like the Mexico City quake of 2017, people caught on camera flashes in the sky minutes after the quake. This is significant because electrical transformers and wiring were clearly disrupted, and the sky was cloudy to reflect the light. In addition, there were apparently thunderstorms in the area. This event created a flurry of interest in EQL based on a misunderstanding: people assumed the flashes were either a result of the fault break or that all flashes, regardless of cause, should be referred to as EQLs.

All four of these events were called “EQLs” but they are questionable. The flashes look conspicuously like electricity transformers exploding or arcing as electrical wires touch. This produces very bright white-blue light that can be reflected by clouds. (Perhaps even the Matsushiro photo could be an electric transformer.) It’s more plausible that this is the explanation for these lights because we know this happens during large quakes in urban areas.

Frustratingly, we have not seen recorded the more unusual forms of EQLs like ground flames, fireballs, sparks and columns. Light pollution, large swaths of paved areas, and lack of connection with the natural state of the land may mean that subtle natural anomalies are masked or that we don’t notice environmental changes as we did in the past.

Scientific Skepticism

The scientific/seismological view of EQLs remains one of skepticism, for good reason. Science is inherently conservative in changing to a new paradigm. Enough trustworthy evidence must be accumulated for the shift to occur and often various social factors make it happen even more slowly. Most of the evidence for EQLs is anecdotal – the worst kind of scientific evidence. Anecdotes can lead you where to look but they contain noise and errors. How would scientists credibly record these observations? Earthquakes happen all over the world and in indeterminate time frames. To set up observations for EQLs and associated precursors, the scale and scope are huge. [13] There are multiple variables that need to be measured and coverage in time and space must be adequate. [1] Even in the situation of known seismically active areas, this is often prohibitively expensive. Not all faults will produce precursors as subsurface regimes are different, even from one quake to another. Perhaps atmospheric conditions could have an effect on perceiving precursors. Since they clearly are not reliable to the extent that we can readily distinguish them, we can conclude they are more of an exception rather than usual. The lack of a plausible mechanism inhibits research. If we don’t have some idea how they COULD be, it is more difficult to plan to catch them.

Finally, scientists are skeptical because not much progress has been made due to the above problems. EQLs fall into the realm of legend and myth and have been lumped into paranormal subject areas like UFOs, ghost lights, and poltergeist activity. Many claims of EQLs seem to be explainable by other causes such as post hoc claims being inaccurate due to stress or misinterpretation, asserting undue meaning to non-associated events (such as iridescent clouds and animal behavior), and alternative coincidental causes such as electrical arcs or regular fires as a result of quakes.

Traditional research in seismology has been focused on mechanical observations – ground deformation, and prior events. [11] Because the reported precursors are very diverse, it’s hard to fathom whether they have the same mechanism. Besides that, we don’t know what the mechanism could be.

The “father of seismology” Robert Mallet talked about EQLs back in the 1850s in his volumes On the Facts of Earthquake Phenomenon. [7] In 1931, 1500 reports existed, collected by professional researchers. Some said at that time there was no doubt they exist. [1] Again in 1973, John Derr of the USGS called them “well established” based on the many documented reports. [4] Several scientists publishing on these topics repeatedly state that EQLs are accepted to exist. This is curious because they remain notably controversial in the bigger geological framing.

USGS page on EQL:

“Geophysicists differ on the extent to which they think that individual reports of unusual lighting near the time and epicenter of an earthquake actually represent EQL:  some doubt that any of the reports constitute solid evidence for EQL, whereas others think that at least some reports plausibly correspond to EQL.”

Proposed mechanisms

Various mechanisms have been proposed to explain EQLs. But, how does the charge get to the surface? If we confirm the occurrence of the charge at the surface, then there is a basis for the reports and they will be greater acceptance. A mechanism that produces air ionization, where electrically charged particles also act as nuclei for condensation and release latent heat, could be at play. Air ionization could possibly produce coronal discharges, sparks, plasma emissions, effects on animals, fog and clouds, and electromagnetic anomalies. The mechanism derived from fault stress must be able to concentrate and maintain large charge densities to reach the surface and release it. Charge accumulation and movement are a problem. [19] Plate tectonics results in squeezing, grinding, and breaking rock slabs and mineral grains on a huge scale. It would be surprising if you don’t get something electrical going on. Several mechanisms to account for EQL and associated phenomena have been proposed:

• Streaming potential. Fluids forced through small pathways generate electrical charges. This does not seem to produce high enough voltage. [11]
• Piezoelectricity. [11] Some minerals like quartz which is abundant produce an electric charge when pressure is applied. This is a favored idea regarding EQLs, however, this happens in a short span and decays quickly as the + and – charges cancel out due to random distribution of crystals. [23] Though it can be associated with radio frequency emission, there seems no way to concentrate the charges and them get them to the surface.
• Vaporization in shear zone. High stresses in the fault zone can produce charge separation and dramatically increase conductivity. Once again, this only works if the path to the surface is short where it may produce a coronal discharge above the fault. Several variables are also at play: amount of water available, width of shear zone, sliding velocity, the breakage of rock (as in a new fault), and the level of stress buildup. [23]
• Sono luminescence. [30] An intense sound wave can cause gas bubbles in liquid to collapse producing a burst of light. What if the same happens with an intense seismic wave? This idea didn’t go very far as it does not account for reports of light beforehand and the effect must occur close to the surface.

All these processes may be going on but none seem to be able to produce what is observed as EQLs on a large scale.

Peroxy defect theory

The current leading candidate for a mechanism is that of the peroxy defect theory. Friedemann Freund is the discoverer and primary promoter of this unifying theory – combining ideas from semi-conductor physics, chemistry, and rock physics into this framework to explain the generation, concentration and movement of a charge cloud to the surface. In simplified terms, the idea is this: There is a percentage of “peroxy defects” in the minerals that make up igneous and metamorphic rocks. The defects in the molecular structure occur when the oxygen molecules are not in their typical valence state but connected by a weak oxygen-oxygen single bond. Under stress, these bonds break and release positive charge carriers, called positive holes (P-holes), which flow via grain-to-grain contact in the rock. They move fast (200 m/s) and far (several km). The cloud of charged particles moves from high to low stress and upon reaching the surface, the theory goes, the cloud can generate local electrical fields that produce massive air ionization causing coronal discharges or bursts of light. Freund concludes this is what generates the necessary charge for the observed EQL effects and associated phenomena. He has demonstrated the charge concentration and movement in the lab on a small scale by stressing rocks. He reports that at around 2 seconds before the rock slab fails, a burst of positive ions is released from the surface of lower stress. The stress gradient drives the movement of the charge. The flow is away from the fault and, notably, to high points like mountains or asperities (areas of rough surface or points). Pointed and irregular structures produce a higher potential gradient and are more prone to emit the corona discharge. Peroxys are not very controversial but this idea to explain EQLs and precursors has not received much attention from seismologists (who are mostly trained in geophysics, not solid-state physics or chemistry). [1,5,10,11]

The peroxy defect theory has its problems – an obvious one being how to test it. We can’t assume that lab results of stressed rock slabs are equivalent to underground conditions. Real-world conditions may be far more heterogeneous and not conform to the ideal conditions that would allow the formation of currents. Freund notes that charge flow may be focused in some areas and blocked in others due to the heterogeneity of the crust. If valid, however, this theory could account for lights of various kinds, fog, clouds, thermal infrared anomalies, ionospheric perturbations, animal behavior, and even strange everyday anomalies because of the cloud of electrically charged particles leaving the ground surface en masse. Perhaps the passing of shear waves may also produce forces that activate the peroxy defects, which may explain Dallaire’s event.

Spookiness

But it’s still just proposed. Dr. Freund and colleagues are having a difficult time getting a forum with today’s seismologists who, generally, still do not consider EQLs and other precursor reports to be important or meaningful. Scientific data gathered so far in support of EQ anomalies was often lucky observations or anecdotes. There are no statistically meaningful data sets yet. Even though some may recognize widely reported anomalous precursors as an unsolved problem, these observations don’t yet fit into the picture, therefore, mainstream seismology efforts are not geared toward supporting an investigation into it. The non-interest in precursor research may be associated with the geological conditions of the U.S. Earthquake precursors such as EQLs are not as prevalent in the U.S. –  90% of such reports are in rift areas in other parts of the world (though several oddities have been reported in modern times in California including Monterey Bay, Hollister, and Santa Rosa). [5 – elec. supplement] Most papers published on anomalous precursors are not in English but are from China, India, Russia, Taiwan and Japan. And finally, the idea of EQLs is tainted by its association with spooky things.

The tectonic strain theory is popular with paranormalists who wish to explain ghosts and hauntings by a localized, natural mechanism. [29] Michael Persinger is a neuroscientist who proposed that fault areas produce stress-induced, transient geophysical fields. Even when no quake occurs, these fields may affect the temporal lobe of the brain which could explain why people report lights and bad feelings, possibly have hallucinations, and experience strange electrical malfunctions making a house appear “haunted”. The data is not robust and additional investigation into the TST petered out.

Strange lights before catastrophes have a folkloric connotation of being “fire from heaven,” “the opening of Hell,” and are associated with superstition and bad omens. During a stressful time, people report weird events and exaggerate or get confused about what they saw which is why anecdotes surrounding earthquakes may be unreliable.

As mentioned previously, earth lights including EQLs overlap with reports of UFOs and spook lights. The association with paranormal or supernatural beliefs means several scientists will steer clear of such anomalies. The paranormal taint may also prevent reputable investigation into these observations which deserve some attention. Note how seriously the public takes reports of strange lights and how most scientists will brush these concerns away as mistakes. People will still seek out information, and if there are no reasonable explanations provided, the public (and media) will pick up on non-reputable explanations. Considering all this, changing scientists’ perception of EQLs is a tough goal.

Establishing the validity of EQLs

The first task to establish the validity of EQLs is to get more reliable data to build the case that they are feasible. There is a lack of facilities to record EQLs or other environmental anomalies. There is insufficient instrumentation to cover large areas for the various parameters that could be measured. Systems designed to detect anomalous fields must be able to distinguish normal fluctuations from anomalies that may be precursors. Quakefinder in Palo Alto, who works in association with Dr. Freund, is a private venture deploying magnetometers. Their goal is to get those large data sets, look for statistical significance, obtain calibrated local background measurements, and get past the anecdotes.

Much related work is going on in earnest in other countries. Cooperation is necessary. Bigger, more robust data sets, and subsequently better results can help bring additional resolution to the picture of all that may happen prior to a quake. Other countries and scientists of other disciplines are moving down this path of exploration.

In conclusion, there is much we don’t yet know about what happens prior to earthquakes. If precursors exist, they can be used to provide some warning – if not perfectly reliable in all cases. Reports of EQLs will remain unconvincing to scientists (but a fascination to the media and public) until more credible evidence is produced. The uncritical and unsophisticated promotion of EQL phenomena on the internet will lead to additional hoaxes and misidentification, making the subject more muddled. Other related observations such as ionospheric anomalies, electromagnetic anomalies, radio frequency interference, infrared anomalies, groundwater changes, and increased radon emissions also need more robust data sets and analysis. There’s a lot of work to do and it’s costly in terms of money, time, and effort.

Mainstream seismologists may be looking in the wrong place or not looking at all for those whispers from the earth that tell us something is about to happen. I’m excited about what will happen with this field of research in the future. Perhaps the next big quake will bring more convincing evidence that mysterious and spooky EQLs are genuine warning beacons that we should watch for and heed.

See me give this talk at the Goddard Scientific Colloquium on March 28, 2018.

https://youtu.be/IkxrUlBcYQ8?si=zUEJgODaH0FNKtAF

References

1. St-Laurent, F., Derr, J.S., & Freund, F.T. (2006). Earthquake lights and the stress-activation of positive hole charge carriers in rocks. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth. 31, 305-312.

2. St-Laurent, F. (2000). The Saguenay, Quebec, Earthquake Lights of November 1988-January 1989: A Comparative Study with Reference to the Geo-atmospheric Lights Classification Proposed by Montandon in 1948 and Description Put Forward by Yasui in 1968. Seismological Research Letters. 71:2, 160-174

3. Deveraux, P. (1990). Earth Lights Revelation: Ufo’s and Mystery Lightform Phenomena: The Earth’s Secret Energy Force. Sterling Pub Co Inc.

4. Derr, J.S. (1973). Earthquake Lights: A Review of Observations and Present Theories. Bull of the Seismological Soc of Am. 63:6, 2177-2187.

5. Theirault, R., St-Laurent, F., Freund, F.T., & Derr, J.S. (2014). Prevalence of Earthquake Lights Associated with Rift Environments Seismological Research Letters 85:1, 159-178 and electronic supplement.

6. Fidani, C. (2010). The earthquake lights (EQL) of the 6 April 2009 Aquila earthquake, in Central Italy. Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 10, 967–978.

7. Zhang, X., Shen, X., & Mioa, Y. (2012). Electromagnetic Anomalies around Wenchuan Earthquake and Their Relationship with Earthquake Preparation. Procedia Environmental Sciences. 12A, 693-701.

8. Corliss, W. (2001). Remarkable luminous phenomena in nature: A catalog of geophysical anomalies. Sourcebook Project.

9. Sidorin, A. Y. (2003). Search for earthquake precursors in multidisciplinary data monitoring of geophysical and biological parameters. Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci. 3, 153–158.

10. Freund, F.T., Kulahci, I.G., Cyr, G., Ling, J., Winnick, M., Tregloan-Reed, J., & Freund, M.M. (2009). Air ionization at rock surfaces and pre-earthquake signals. J of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics. 71, 1824–1834.

11. Freund, F.T. , Ouillon, G., Scoville, J., & Sornette, D. (2018). Earthquake precursors in the light of peroxy defects theory: critical review of systematic observations. European Physical Journal, in press.

12. Pulinets, S.A. (1998). Seismic Activity as a Source of the Ionospheric Variability. Adv. Space Res. 22: 6, 903-906.
and
Pulinets, S.A., & Boyarchuk, K. (2004). Ionospheric Precursors of Earthquakes. Springer-Verlag: Berlin Heidelberg.

13. Bleier, T., Dunson, C., Maniscalco, M., Bryant, N., Bambery, R., & Freund, F.T. (2009). Investigation of ULF magnetic pulsations, air conductivity changes, and infrared signatures associated with the 30 October Alum Rock M5.4 earthquake. Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci. 9, 585–603.

14. Kirschvink, J.L. (2000). Earthquake Prediction by Animals: Evolution and Sensory Perception. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of Am., 90: 2, 312–323.

15. Warwick, J.W., Stoker, C., & Meyer, T.R. (1982) Radio Emission Associated with Rock Fracture: Possible Application to the Great Chilean Earthquake of May 22, 1960. J of Geophysical Research 87:B4 2851-2859.

16. Tate, J., & Daily, W. (1989). Evidence of electroseismic phenomena. Physics of the Earth and Planetary Interiors. 57:1-2, 1-10.

17. Park, S.K., Johnston, M.J.S., Madden, T.R., Morgan, F.D., & Morrison, H.F. (1993). Electromagnetic Precursors to Earthquakes in the ULF Band: A Review of Observations and Mechanisms. Reviews of Geophysics, 31:2, 112-132.

18. Chuo, Y.J., Chen, Y.I., Liu, J.Y., & Pulinets, S.A. (2001). Ionospheric foF2 Variations Prior to Strong Earthquakes in Taiwan Area. Adv. Space Res. 27, 6–7, 1305-1310.

19. Parrot, J.S.E. (1990). Electromagnetic Disturbances Associated With Earthquakes: An Analysis of Ground-Based and Satellite Data. J of Scientific Exploration. 4: 2, 203-221.

20. Tributsch, H. (1982). When the Snakes Awake: Animals and Earthquake Prediction. MIT Press: Cambridge MA.

21. Fuller, M.L. (1912). The New Madrid Earthquake. USGS Bulletin 494.

22. Enriquez, A. (2003). The shining. New Scientist, 179: 2402, 26–29.

23. Lockner, D.A, Johnston, M.J.S., & Byerlee, J.D. (1983). Nature 302:5903 28-33.

24. Saraf, A.K., & Choudhury, S. (2005). Thermal Remote Sensing Technique in the Study of Pre-Earthquake Thermal Anomalies. J of Indian Geophys. Union. 9: 3, 197-207.

25. Enomoto, Y., & Zheng, Z. (1998). Possible evidences of earthquake lightning accompanying the 1995 Kobe earthquake inferred from the Nojima fault gouge. GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS. 25: 14, 2721-2724.

26. Losseva, T.V., & Nemchinov, I.V. (2005). Earthquake lights and rupture processes. Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci. 5, 649–656.

27 Grant, R.A., & Halliday, T. (2010). Predicting the unpredictable; evidence of pre-seismic anticipatory behaviour in the common toad. Journal of Zoology 281:4, 263-271.

28 Ikeya, M. (2004) Earthquakes and Animals: From Folk Legends to Science. World Scientific Publishing Co., Pte. Ltd.: Singapore.

29. Persinger, M.A. (1985). Geophysical variables and behavior: XXII. The tectonogenic strain continuum of unusual events. Percept Mot Skills. 60: 1, 59-65.

30. Johnston, C., Light from seismic waves. Nature. 354, 361.

Mexico “earthquake lights” of 2021

An earthquake of magnitude 7.0 occurred 11 miles (17.7 km) northeast of Acapulco, Mexico on the evening of September 7, 2021. As usual, the event was followed by personal videos flooding social media showing people scrambling outside. The sky is full of light bursts. Quickly, the media reported that these were “earthquake lights” or “rare lightning” (as reported by Reuters).

In footage from Acapulco, the flashes start shortly after the ground starts shaking, illuminating previously darkened hills behind the ocean bay and at one point appearing to bathe buildings on the shoreline in bright light.

In Mexico City, panicked residents tried to keep their balance outside an apartment building while the sky flashed blue, white and pink, another video on social media showed.

Reuters news

The sources seemed to do a poor to nonexistent job of critically assessing this information and took the opinion that these flashes were unusual or natural. Maybe it’s because earthquake lights sound plausible and are a dramatic explanation for the flashes. But there are three specific reasons why we can reasonably conclude that these flashes were NOT earthquake lights. 1. They appear to be along the horizon, not high in the sky. 2. They occurred after the quake, sometimes minutes later. 3. They are not the typical and unique descriptions of earthquake lights as glows, balls, or unusual sparks, curtains or flames.

Instead, these flashes are almost certainly from arcing wires from electrical lines that are broken or touching each other. Or, they are electrical transformers that have been damaged and emitting flashes. They can also be normal lightning flashing. Due to most reports being in Spanish, I’m not readily able to tell if a thunderstorm was occurring but it is visibly raining in some news videos. So, a thunderstorm is also a possible explanation. If so, that event is unconnected to seismic activity.

https://youtu.be/ndhLCm-ZvyQ

A final point: it’s absurd to report on earthquake lights as if they are a regular occurrence. If they exist at all, they are very rare and our documented evidence for them is scant and questionable. Usually, the evidence is only eyewitness accounts. If these flashes were anomalous, and indicative of earthquake lights, that would be huge news. However, like other recent quakes that follow the same pattern of flashing lights immediately after shaking, we know these are not anomalies.

If people have recordings of pre-earthquake glows, lights, or other anomalous phenomena, I’d love to hear it. But so far, I see no evidence of earthquake lights in these post-quake videos. Do not assume that news sources, even normally reliable sources are scientifically informed on this niche subject. If the reports are simply repeating accounts that have someone’s personal opinions embedded in them, that’s not factual.

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