A Destructive Earth Quake

Tonight, I read the article Mrs. Jarret poster to her blog. On monday, there was a massive earthquake in China. It starts off by posing the question can an earthquake be predicted? It states that most scientists would insist that there is no possible way of predicting or preventing these deadly natural disasters. It then goes on to say that Chinese bloggers are starting to say, that in fact, the extremely high numbers of casualties could have been lowered by a significant amount. They go on to say that alerts that were reported seismology bureau were ledgy brushed off and not taking into account. Even though it says that the claim was debunked, many rumors have still been spread around. The rumors have come up numerous times, including at a live press conference. When a question was asked about the rumors, the television quickly switched to a clip of rescue footage. This just goes to show that even though rumors, most of the time are not true, they still get many peoples' attention. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/16/world/asia/16rumors.html?_r=1&fta=y

Jacobs, Andrew, "Superstitions About Quake Meet The Web, Irritating The Chinese Authorities" New York Times. 16 May.