China earthquake: Scientists detected threatening signals in advance

Srinagar, Dec 20: Hours before the deadly 6.2 magnitude earthquake struck Gansu province in China, the scientists had got prior threatening signal but couldn’t conceive what it would be and what will happen, a media report has claimed.

As per reports, 120 people have died since the temblor struck with the epicenter in Jishishan. Although, earthquakes cannot be predicted, researchers in the Chinese province of Shaanxi have developed a technique which has allowed them to forecast successfully every earthquake with a magnitude of 7.0 or above in the past 10 years, South China Morning Post reported.

It said that scientists however couldn’t predict the location of these earthquakes. Using high-precision equipment in order to monitor the Earth’s gravitational field at low frequencies, scientists look for any anomalies in the gravitational waves –sign that an earthquake is ready to take place.

About Gansu earthquake, the report stated that researchers knew latest earthquake was on the way when they received a text alert about abnormal data readings from multiple sensors. The team then began discussing where the earthquake might strike and calculated that the earthquake had a high probability of hitting within three to five days. The researchers also knew that the magnitude of the earthquake would be around 6.27.

Zhang Maoshen said, “We didn’t think it would be this close” while Liu Huaqiang, a professor at Northwestern Polytechnic University in Xian said that as the sensors were located in different cities, the anomalous waves were all recorded at nearly the same time.

“So it wasn’t hard to understand whether this was an earthquake precursor”, he said, adding, “The only aspect we cannot determine is the location."

Were early warning signals sent?

The China Earthquake Early Warning Network sent text alerts within 30 seconds of the earthquake hitting areas around the Gansu quake’s epicenter. Those closest to it received a text alert in only 12 seconds.