Shanghai seismologists use not only the most sensitive technology but also the most sensitive lions, tigers and bears in the zoo to help them predict earthquakes. They all say: No way (99.9 percent), write Zhang Jun and Douglas Williams.
Animals at the zoo are supposed to amuse and please, but some play a bigger role: earthquake prediction.
It's well known that many animals with their keen senses pick up vibrations and changes in the atmosphere before earthquakes. The changes cause bizarre animal behavior. Carefully charting their normal patterns and abnormal, erratic behavior can assist in earthquake prediction.
In Shanghai, 12 zoos form a network in which animals are closely observed every day and behavior logs are kept. Unusual behavior if prolonged and unexplained is telephoned to the Shanghai Seismological Bureau, which reports to the China Seismological Bureau. Species from bears to snakes are observed.
Zhou Ji is in charge of the animal seismology program at Heping Park, the only zoo in the downtown area.
"To know animals, we have to understand them," Zhou says, and after 20 years of animal keeping, he really knows the beasts.
Every day he reports on the big ones, lions, tigers, leopards, bears and others, while other zoo keepers watch birds and other animals.
The animal-watching project started in the early 1980s after the world's third-worst earthquake in 1976 that obliterated Tangshan in Hebei Province and killed more than 242,000. Strange geologic signs and animal behavior were reported before the temblor: Chickens refused to eat and acted wildly; dogs barked furiously; goldfish jumped out of their bowls.
"My job requires me to always take better care of animals. If not, we cannot succeed," says Zhou. He works from 8am to 4:30pm every day, rain or shine. He works directly behind the big animal cages - where he can observe each of them, despite the dreadful smells.
Every day, Zhou and his younger colleague take turns checking whether all the animals are behaving "normally." If not, they must find an explanation or call the earthquake bureau.
Abnormal behavior includes moving about restlessly, jumping, making noises (roaring, hissing, growing, etc) or rushing at fences for prolonged periods.
"Lions and tigers are easy to watch but leopards are not," says Zhou, noting that the most challenging part of his job is to tell sense from nonsense.
Three weeks ago, a leopard named "Baobao" suffered from painful inflamed claws, so it didn't eat for two days - this caused abnormal behavior in the hungry beast.
Zhou spent hours finding out the reason and ruling out any connection between Baobao's abnormal behavior and earth vibrations. He eventually asked a veterinarian to treat the big cat.
Before going home, Zhou puts a mark below the name of each of the big animals if they behave normally. Since the 1980s, he has filled three dictionary-thick report books.
Heping Park has more than 200 kinds of animals. In 1996, Zhou observed all the birds hanging upside down from the top of their cages, like bats. Several days later, a minor earthquake shook Changshu in neighboring Jiangsu Province. People in Shanghai could feel it.
Besides feeding the animals, Zhou carefully rubs the fur of the animals every day to create rapport, as if caring for children.
To date there has been no systematic study of animals' abnormal behavior in advance of earthquakes in China. But animals' special reaction to earth vibrations and atmospheric pressure changes before quakes have been noted around the world.
Before the devastating earthquake and tsunami in December of 2004, elephants in Thailand migrated from their resting places; tree frogs jumped into bungalow bathrooms; snakes slithered into visitors' shoes.
Shanghai is on an alluvial plain that includes a layer mainly made up of mud and silt extending an average 200 meters beneath the surface to the bedrock. The city is outside the country's earthquake belt so it is highly unlikely that it will be hit by a temblor.
But since there is still a possibility, seismologists have constantly upgraded their quake-detection equipment. The animal-detection project has been used for the longest period. According to the bureau, the city experienced three "noticeable earthquakes" in its recent history in 1984, 1990 and 1996.
Some local animals experts are urging the central government to open a new subject: animal seismology.
Noting strange animal behavior contributed to the biggest success in earthquake prediction in China. In 1975 in Liaoning Province in the north, experts predicted a 7.5-magnitude quake based on seismic activity and pre-cursory observation - namely the activity of agitated animals.
"That earthquake caused a huge amount of damage but the number of fatalities was minimal as all the citizens were advised to evacuate," says Professor Ma Qinzhong, a director at the Shanghai Seismological Bureau.
There were many pre-cursory tremors and animals behaves strangely. "Chickens flew up into the trees," says Ma, a seismologist for 20 years. "Mice dashed about and dogs barked and barked."
All of these factors contributed to the two-day warning residents received. It is estimated that over 100,000 lives were saved.
Though the animals and the seismographs are expected to provide warning, Shanghai is not in danger of a major quake. "The conditions for a strong earthquake or a tsunami are not present in Shanghai at present," says seismologist Ma who comes from Lanzhou in Gansu Province, which is no stranger to quakes.
"We're luckily not on the edge of a tectonic plate or on an earthquake belt here in Shanghai. Serious quakes are therefore almost impossible," he says. "The sea to the east of Shanghai is not deep, and so even a middle-strong quake in the sea floor would only affect shallow water."
Earthquakes in China
Though experts say chances of a big quake in Shanghai are virtually nil, three great quakes, including the world's deadliest, have shaken other parts of China in the past 450 years.
The most recent, the world's third-deadliest, struck Tangshan in Hebei Province on July 28, 1975. Conservative estimates put toll at 242,000. The area had no history of earthquakes and there were no warning tremors.
The world's fifth-worst earthquake hit what is now the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in 1920, killing more than 230,000 people.
The world's most deadly earthquake struck what is now Shaanxi Province on January 23, 1556, reportedly killing 830,000 people. That quake was also felt in what are now Shanxi, Henan, Gansu, Hebei, Shandong, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu and Anhui provinces. Structures in an 840-kilometer-wide area were destroyed and in some counties 60 percent of the population was killed.
(Original headline: Lions roar: 'No quake' )
