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jtmarshiii t1_j7hti7a wrote

This looks like typical roosting behavior just before sunrise. Science has nat not seen any evidence that animals acting weird before earthquakes.

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svenminoda t1_j7hx2aj wrote

I've seen a few videos of animals (pets moslty) looking like they react a few seconds before the hit. Sadly, it may be annecdotal, skewed (external stimuli making the pets react at something else off camera) etc

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jtmarshiii t1_j7i09tz wrote

Science has looked into it and haven’t seen any evidence. Seconds before the quake may just show they heard or felt it before it was clear on video or the one video taping.

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CrimsAK t1_j7i47q9 wrote

Well it’s kind of hard to study because you need to know when an earthquake is coming first.

There’s at least one study on dogs that suggest they may be able to hear seismic activity beforehand. This was part of an existing study on dogs that was ongoing and had a strange data point just before an earthquake, but it’s not something you can really do an accurate study on.

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Its_Nitsua t1_j7ilseq wrote

Lack of evidence for something isn’f evidence to the contrary

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jtmarshiii t1_j7kpcws wrote

Things proven that don’t exist also have higher lack of evidence, no?

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SammyTheSloth t1_j7j8z0c wrote

It makes sense that dog would sense the earthquake slightly before humans. They have a highly developed inner ear that helps them react to balance and spacial awareness.

Unless it’s my dog. He runs into furniture at a walking pace.

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ConstantlyComments t1_j7jqatr wrote

In my college Animal Behavior class we talked about some cases, but that was quite a few years ago so I don’t remember details. All I really remember was it had to do with infrasound/ultrasound. I did a quick Google and found an article but don’t have time right now to read the whole thing. Here’s an excerpt though:

“The Boxing Day Tsunami on 26 December 2004 was created by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake, 160 km off the northwest coast of Sumatra, one minute before 0800 local time (00:58:53 UCT). The earthquake resulted in a 15.6 m (50 ft) wave that crashed onto the coast of Sumatra. This wave impacted the shoreline, producing low-frequency sounds at and below 100 Hz with much of the energy residing in infrasonic frequencies between 1 Hz and 10 Hz. These sounds travel in the atmosphere at the speed of sound. At the tropical ocean surface this speed will be about 1260 km/h. The tsunami, in contrast, travels at a speed of 700 km/h. Elephants at locations 1000 km distant from Sumatra (Phuket, Thailand and Yala National Park, Sri Lanka) detected and responded to this sound wave 38.1 min prior to the arrival of the tsunami. No elephant in either location was lost or injured. In contrast, a significant number of people on the beaches of Thailand lost their lives [17].”

Edit: And I do realize this may have had more to do with the tsunami as opposed to the earthquake, but if someone wants to read that article there may be more in there specifically regarding earthquakes.

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jtmarshiii t1_j7kogjz wrote

They say might a lot and no hard proof and has not been replicated in controls environment… so basically scientists are saying we have antidotal evidence but not one controlled study.

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societymike t1_j7jtuj7 wrote

With that said, I was sitting in our office at work in Tokyo on March 11th 2011 with 3 coworkers just bs'ing about our day when the fish in the aquarium we were facing just started going nuts, swimming around fast, hitting the sides and jumping, and one managed to jump out and we put him back in, but they wouldn't calm down. We were all wondering WTF are they doing, they are normally calm and slow all day, but within a minute or so, the water started splashing like someone was moving the aquarium, (but it's heavy and sitting on a concrete wall) and we realized it was a little earthquake. Ok, nbd, we just had a couple trimmers last night, the fish probably felt it faster than us.. but that's when it started getting stronger and stronger and didn't stop, we evacuated, and it just kept going for a few more minutes, things breaking, lights on the flight line looking like windshield wipers, garage doors falling, phones going crazy. Later, we got back inside and only 1 fish was still in the tank sadly.

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