Does the USGS still maintain a prediction council?
No, although there are ongoing discussions about reinstating it. FEMA bases the amount of funds that they provide each state to address its earthquake hazard on the USGS National Seismic Hazard maps. The states in turn use the map to determine how many counties fall within a certain area of risk. Will the next generation of the National Seismic Maps change the area of concern for the central US? If so what is this change based on? The revised maps incorporate new results generated since the mid-1990s when the current generation of maps was made. Draft versions of the new National Seismic Hazard maps exhibit relatively small changes in the hazard estimates for the central and eastern U.S compared to the 1996 maps. These changes are largely due to our increased knowledge of large-earthquake chronologies for the New Madrid and Charleston, S.C. areas, a change in the method used to account for the uncertainties in input parameters (i.e. use of a logic tree), and the use of additional relat
