It’s now 2021. It might feel like the start of a new year to most of you – and hopefully a happy one – but there are some people who believe that Californians ought to have nothing to be happy about this year. Rather than making plans for the twelve months to come, they believe that we should be packing up our personal belongings, selling our houses, and getting out of the state as quickly as they possibly can. The people we’re talking about are those who still believe in the predictions of Nostradamus. According to their interpretation of his writings, California is doomed to be utterly destroyed by an earthquake sometime this calendar year.
It goes without saying that this is a somewhat bold prediction. There are a few California-related predictions you could make for 2021 and have most people agree with you. The LA Dodgers might win the World Series again, for example. California might finally pass its sports betting bill and open the door to online slots websites, as it’s been promising (or should that be ‘threatening?’) to do for some time. There wouldn’t be much sense in allowing California natives to play slots if there’s no internet because an earthquake knocked out all the power, though. Statistically speaking, you’re an awful lot more likely to win a huge jackpot playing online slots than to see a colossal earthquake in California next year, but should we rule the possibility out altogether?
It’s not impossible for an earthquake to happen in the state, as we all know (some of us to our cost). We’re also probably approaching the point of being overdue at least a small one. The last earthquakes of any significance to hit the Golden State were the Ridgecrest earthquakes of 2019, which injured 25 people and tore up the desert floor while on their way to causing more than six billion dollars’ worth of damage. There were a few small rumblings in 2020, but nothing newsworthy. Before that, we’d have to go back to 2014 for the last major seismic event, which was the South Napa earthquake in North Bay. That came four years after a pair of large earthquakes in Eureka and Baja California, which were two years after the Chino Hills earthquake that struck LA.
In the past, though, earthquakes were a lot more frequent (and often more fierce) than they are now. The early 1990s were rife with earthquakes, with six occurring in 1992 alone and three in the previous three years. There were fifteen during the 1980s. The history of tectonic movement in the area suggests that the last few years have been a lull and that eventually, a fuller ‘schedule’ of earthquakes will be resumed. That means Nostradamus might not necessarily have been wrong about an earthquake hitting California this year, but that doesn’t mean it would be the kind of apocalyptic event that he apparently foresaw five hundred years ago. California wasn’t torn to pieces by any of the earthquakes that shook the land during the 20th century, so why would a large earthquake in the 21st be any different?
The idea of a large earthquake comes from a typically vague section of the supposed fortune-teller’s writings. He speaks of “great calamity” at a “sloping park,” which will see the “lands of the west” subjected to “fire in the ship,” along with captivity and plague, apparently caused by the twin factors of Saturn fading and Mercury in Sagittarius. The “lands of the west” reference has been interpreted to mean California, but how the rest of the description has been interpreted as an earthquake is anybody’s guess. Nevertheless, the story has appeared in several major newspapers during the past week and is also circulating on the internet. We even have a specific date for when the disaster will strike, which is given as November 25th. That means we’ll be waiting quite some time to find out whether Nostradamus was right.
Those loyal to the teachings of Nostradamus claim that upward of seventy percent of his past predictions have come true, although that figure is debated by academics and researchers. If we’re to assume he’s right about the earthquake, it might be the least of the things that the people of the world have to worry about during 2021 – even those living in an area that might be affected by such an event. His 2021 predictions also include a deadly global famine and what some people are describing as a ‘zombie apocalypse.’ which would endanger all life on Earth. It’s hard to imagine such a thing happening from where we are now, but we suppose it would also have been difficult to foresee 9/11 before it happened. Nostradamus is said to have predicted 9/11, just as he’s said to have predicted the rise and fall of Adolf Hitler. Much of these predictions, though, rely on people ‘decoding’ the language of his 16th-century writings – and most of that decoding can only be done after the event and with the benefit of hindsight. Given that the apparently-forthcoming zombie apocalypse will cause “all the world to end,” there would be nobody around to do that decoding after it’s over.
We shouldn’t put too much stock in the work of Nostradamus. He’s apparently predicted the end of the world on several occasions only for it not to happen, and he has predictions on file for many years beyond 2021 regardless of the fact that he appears to predict the end of the world during the next twelve months. We won’t claim to be fortune tellers, but if we were forecasting the future, we don’t expect California to be subjected to any kind of catastrophe that it hasn’t faced and survived in the past during 2021. That being said, there’s no harm in being cautious. If you haven’t assessed your home for its potential to survive an earthquake recently, this might be an appropriate time to do so. It also wouldn’t be the worst idea in the world to make sure that your home insurance covers earthquakes, too. Remember to tell your insurance adviser that Nostradamus sent you – that ought to liven up an otherwise dull conversation!
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