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Originally from the North of England. Growing up my mother had a huge leather bound book full of stories of ghosts, alien sightings, spontaneous combustion, fairies, ghouls and more. You name it, it was in there. And I was fascinated. I've often thought about that book. I'd love to ask my mother about it but alas, she is no longer with us. So I resolved to create this site. It's the closest thing to it I could get. I hope that some of the joy I had reading that book is passed on to you here today.

Iben Browning the disaster king of texas
Bizarre Disasters History People

Iben Browning – The Disaster King of Texas

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Browning was born in 1918 in Edna, Texas. He served in World War 2 after graduating with majors in Maths and Physics.

Although not qualified, he became interested in climate change and weather forecasting. This led to him starting the Browning Newsletter in 1974. During this period he is alledged to have asserted that the earth was entering a cooling period. This cooling period, he reasoned, was directly linked to heightened troubles with humans, such as war, famine and revolutions. These admittedly alternative ideas are not why Dr Browning found notoriety though. We are coming to that.

The Science of Collapse

Iben Browning made several predictions about the climate, erupting volcanoes and Government collapse. All failed to materialise.

The one he is best remembered for however, happened in 1990.

Iben predicted that a major earthquake would happen on the New Madrid Fault (located in the USA, stretching across eight states). This eruption, according to Iben, would occur close to the 2nd or 3rd of December, 1990.

Normally, this would have been ignored completely. But, (there’s always a but) not this time. Seismologists ignored the claim, reasoning that to even respond would lend legitimacy to the claim. When an earthquake with a magnitude of 4.7 hit Cape Girardeau, Missouri in September of 1990, it brought a lot of interest back to earthquakes in the region. Suddenly, people were willing to listen to Dr Browning.

Of course, the media loved the story. Even though there is no verifiable way to predict earthquakes, they ran with it. Whipping up a storm of publicity for Iben and his claims.

Suddenly, everyone was stocking up supplies and conducting earthquake drills. Although most adults agreed it was probably not going to happen, it’s also worth noting that living on a fault line, buying into the panic was probably easy to do.

The Night of the Quake

On those nights in early December of 1990, a huge media presence gathered around New Madrid, Missouri.

The streets were empty. As were shelves in the stores. And it’s a good job too, because absolutely nothing happened. Yep, the prediction turned out to be wrong. Just as the seismologists thought. Since that night, stretching all throughout time until today, a major earthquake still has not hit the fault line.

A study done by the USGS (United States Geological Survey) described Iben’s methodology as pseudoscience. A study conducted by Dartmouth dove into detail about why Iben Browning’s prediction was given any credence at all.

Here are a few of the key points:

  • Awareness heightened after Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989.
  • Failure of Seismologists to refute prediction.
  • Media’s need for a juicy story.
  • 4.7 magnitude earthquake in Missouri, September 26th, 1990.
  • Mid November broadcast of a television series about an earthquake disaster.
  • Distribution of earthquake preparedness information that did not contain any disclaimer of Iben Browning’s prediction.

Aftermath

It’s here that I would love to tell you we all learnt lessons from this. But the media continues to spin alternative views into commentary and narrative. If anything, it has gotten worse.

Even Dr Browning escaped any real condemnation. He died less than a year later, on the 18th of July, 1991.

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