Social media users claimed that animals in Turkey and Syria were behaving strangely before the massive 7.8 magnitude quake occurred, followed by another significant quake.
Footage circulating on social media shows birds flying erratically over snow-covered buildings, dogs howling loudly. Then, devastating earthquakes in Turkey and Syria leveled buildings and killed more than 5,000 people. That said, these animals have given a sign of impending disaster.
So far, there has been no verification of the veracity of the circulating video footage. From a scientific point of view, however, the idea that animals can detect large earthquakes before humans has long been a credible theory since ancient times.
In addition, there is indeed scientific research that supports it. Just as seismological machines can detect vibrations that are undetectable by the human body, animals more readily and sensitively sense small initial quakes that travel through the Earth seconds before stronger earthquake waves strike, scientists say. They may even be able to feel it before an earthquake occurs.
According to the US Geology Survey (USGS), the abnormal behavior of animals in the seconds before an earthquake is explained by the difference between the two seismic waveforms. Primary, or P, waves are the first emitted from an earthquake, traveling at a speed of several miles per second from the epicenter. This is more visible in animals, says the USGS. The P wave is followed by a more powerful secondary wave, or S wave, which shakes the ground in a circular motion.
"Very few humans have noticed the smaller P waves, which travel fastest from the earthquake's source and arrive before the larger S waves," the USGS said. "But many animals with more keen senses are able to perceive P waves seconds before the S waves arrive," he explained.
The initial vibrations, which are detected and analyzed by seismological engines, are also used by early warning systems to predict the occurrence of an earthquake, usually with a warning of less than one minute. But can animals sense earthquakes earlier, and better than modern machines?
One researcher says animals may be able to feel an earthquake even before the first one occurs. "We have very good indications that animals do feel earthquake precursors, and it's not seismic activity," said Martin Wikelski of the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior, who led the study.
In a peer-reviewed study published in 2020, researchers attached electronic tags to cattle, dogs and sheep on an Italian farm to observe their movements for several months when an earthquake was detected nearby. They found that the animal was unusually 'superactive', moving continuously for more than 45 minutes, before seven out of eight major earthquakes were detected nearby.
Research conducted with special devices for animals, shows that animals may be able to detect a potential earthquake more than 12 hours before humans, long before an earthquake occurs.
"The reason the animals reacted unusually was not clear, he said. There are indications that they were trying to tell us. How they did it, we don't know yet," he said.
He believed that animals' ability to sense danger may be related to their ability to communicate with one another.
"The cows freeze at first, they don't move at all. And that makes the dogs very nervous, and they start going crazy, barking. Then the sheep get stressed. The cows start to read the situation and overall, all the animals get anxious and act out. crazy," said Wikelski.
In Wikelski's study, animals may be able to detect earthquakes as early as 12 miles from the epicenter. He wants to do more research, possibly whether farm animals react to levels of iron released into the air by underground pressure.
"There are other factors that these animals seem to understand, but it's still a mystery," he said.
However, a 2018 review of 700 recorded claims of abnormal animal behavior before the earthquake required more evidence before drawing any conclusions. The researchers focused on the question of whether animals have the ability to detect earthquakes faster than seismic machines.
Many historical examples of animals behaving oddly were finally explained by seismic earthquakes seconds before a larger earthquake wave occurred. Much of the evidence so far is too anecdotal and retrospective to be reliable.
However, there are quite reliable examples from history and today. One of the earliest anecdotal stories, attributed to the Roman writer Aelian, details how mice, snakes, centipedes, and beetles fled the city of Helike before the area was destroyed by an earthquake and tsunami in 373 BC.
Then there is the example in 2016, 15 minutes before the earthquake hit Oklahoma, United States, birds flew in such significant numbers that thousands of them could be observed in the air with radar technology.
