EARTHQUAKE PROJECTOR DIES AT AGE 73

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - Iben Browning, who gained the nation's attention last year when he projected a major earthquake would hit the Midwest, died Thursday of a heart attack. He was 73.

Browning, a biophysicist who studied climatic cycles, died at an Albuquerque hospital. He had lived in Sandia Park east of Albuquerque.

His projection, which didn't come true, was widely criticized by geologists, who said it had no scientific basis.

He had said there was an even-odds chance that a quake would strike the New Madrid Fault, which runs through parts of Illinois, Missouri and Arkansas, last December.

Many residents along the fault left the area during the week that Browning projected the quake would hit, while others stockpiled food and supplies. Some schools canceled classes.

Law enforcement officers and rescue officials set up emergency headquarters and participated in mock rescues in anticipation of the major quake that never happened.

"We owe him a debt of gratitude," New Madrid Mayor Dick Phillips said Friday. "I respected the man's intelligence. In this particular case, thank God, his prediction didn't come to pass, but it made us realize that we had never made any kind of preparations for a natural disaster. We owe him for that."

In early December, New Madrid was inundated by the news media and the joke made the rounds that the greatest danger residents faced was being run over by a television truck.

Many residents enjoyed the notoriety, however, and no one could deny that it had turned New Madrid, at least briefly, into a boom town.

"He certainly put us on the map," said Virginia Carlson, director of the New Madrid Historical Museum, one of the biggest benefactor's of Browning's projection.

"The tourists are still flocking to the museum and the T-shirts are selling well," she said. "We had already planned an addition to the museum, but the money that is coming in from this has allowed us to do it earlier than we planned.

"We were going to invite him for the official opening, toward the end of the summer, to see the building and the earthquake exhibit. We thought it might be safe for him then. He didn't come at the time of the projected quake."

Beyond the hype and the jokes, Carlson said, the area took a lot of Browning's warnings to heart, noting that the area was hit by a series of quakes in 1811 and 1812 that were the strongest known in North America.

"Earthquake awareness is part of us now," she said. "Even the new museum building is seismically designed. The old part, which is part of an old saloon, will come down at the first little shake."

Browning talked about the New Madrid Fault projection at an Albuquerque Rotary Club meeting in May.

"It wasn't a prediction," he said. "It was a probability. I am a business consultant. Business people know how to deal with probability - the public doesn't."

For decades, Browning had been telling businesses and corporations that natural forces such as storms, tornadoes and volcanic activity would have a big effect on their businesses.

Browning's consulting clients and subscribers to his eight-page monthly "Browning Newsletter" included Litton Industries, Lockheed Corp. and Texas millionaire Bunker Hunt.

The projections they received were sometimes grim.

In 1988, Browning said Dust Bowl conditions could develop between 1989 and 1993 in the nation's High Plains.

But his prediction of the New Madrid quake was the first one that aroused the interest of the public.

Top earthquake experts had insisted all along there was no scientific basis to Browning's projection, which was based on solar, lunar and tidal forces.

Last October, a committee of 12 scientists from the National Earthquake Prediction Evaluation Council released a report that said there was no scientific basis for a belief that a quake was imminent.

The experts said Browning's method of correlating tides and earthquake occurrence was nothing new or different. They said previous studies had employed the method, but very few had shown any correlation.

His nephew Bob Pinto said Browning didn't look for media attention.

"He did not seek it out and once he was in it, he didn't enjoy it at all," Pinto said.

Browning is survived by his wife, Florence; daughter Evelyn Garriss of Sandia Park; and two grandchildren.