ShareThisRick Jirsa just wanted to warn his family and close friends in California that a large earthquake might be on the horizon. But the e-mail he sent them Feb. 25 shook things up more than any of the tremors that triggered the message in the first place.
The Moreno Valley High School teacher's e-mail bounced all over the Internet. Somewhere along the way, it landed in Riverside County Fire Chief John Hawkins' mailbox.
Hawkins, who doesn't know Jirsa, said he was concerned about the prediction that scores of small earthquakes between Redlands and Moreno Valley in recent weeks might be precursors to a major quake in Southern California. He wondered if there was any merit to it.
Experts say there is currently no way to predict an earthquake.
Hawkins forwarded the message to Peter Lent, county office of emergency services deputy director, and to members of the fire department's executive team.
"I wanted to validate as best as possible the prediction," he said.
The next thing he knew, the e-mail warning was popping up all over the Internet with his name attached as the author. Hawkins said he hasn't been able to determine who altered the original e-mail and sent it out.
"Someone else rearranged the content ... and sent it all over and posted it on several blog sites," Hawkins said. "It appeared it had been written by me, which was not correct."
For one thing, he said, he would never start an e-mail with "Hi."
The warning, attributed to him, appeared on several blogs and Internet sites such as rumormillnews.com. Contacted about the posting on her Rumormill News site, operator Rayelan Allen said she received the e-mailed earthquake warning anonymously.
"It sounds like you are trying to discredit (Hawkins) by having him associated with the number one conspiracy site in the world!!" Allen wrote in an e-mail.
Hawkins found himself doing damage control.
"Once it got out of hand, I sent (an e-mail) to all county officials saying I didn't have a hand in this," he said.
Meanwhile, Jirsa, an earth science teacher, was dealing with fallout of his own. He had included his phone number at the bottom of the original message.
"I've gotten like over 300 phone calls," Jirsa said, "some at 2 a.m. I learned my lesson. I won't do that again."
While earning a geology degree at the University of Redlands, Jirsa said he spent time doing seismic mapping in the very area where the recent quakes occurred. He regularly monitors earthquake activity maps on the Internet.
In the Feb. 25 e-mail, he wrote: "If things continue we may be faced with a catastrophic quake very soon."
"It wasn't a prediction," Jirsa said. "But things are kind of moving, and you ought to be prepared."
Hawkins said he has received about 100 e-mails in response to the viral message. Early this week he got a congratulatory note crediting him with correctly predicting the 4.4 magnitude quake in Pico Rivera.
Jirsa can top that. He said he has received calls and e-mails offering kudos for predicting the recent 8.8 magnitude quake in Chile.
Hawkins said county officials checked with earthquake experts at the U.S. Geological Survey and Caltech in Pasadena.
"Neither Caltech or USGS can validate or refute any prediction, but they did not believe that the quakes were (abnormal)," he said.
He added that the e-mail may have actually been a benefit to some people who read it. The latter half of the message contained directions on how to prepare for an earthquake.
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
Must credit The Press-Enterprise of Riverside, Calif.
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