Are earthquakes predictable?
I hear that for scientists it is very controversial to if earthquakes are predictable or not. There was an earthquake in Italy that killed hundreds of people on April 6, 2009. And there was a scientist who predicted that an earthquake was going to happen in that same place and everyone rejected him. And look at what happened know. =( So i want to see what you think based on your knowledge on Earthquakes.
Not yet.
The most successful earthquake prediction was in China in 1975. The city of Haicheng was evacuated hours before a magnitude 7.3 quake, saving thousands of lives (see link). However, a year and a half later, the magnitude 7.8 Tangshan earthquake was not predicted, and it may have killed twice as many people as the 2004 tsunami.
The bottom line is that some, but not all, earthquakes are preceded by certain changes; but the same changes can take place without an earthquake occurring. An earthquake alarm could cause panic, and a false alarm could cause people to ignore the next alarm, which might not be false. Geologists have a lot more to learn before they can make reliable short-term earthquake forecasts, but they’re working on it. In the meantime, we can expect even more earthquake warnings to be discovered only after the fact.
Planetary World Service (April 9-15, 2009): Earthquake in Italy