The ‘Big One’ on 9/23/15?

Some people may have stretched their imagination a bit too far with the warnings for the “Big One,” the timing of which no one knows.

As we stated in a previous column (“A positive ‘mental drill’ for the ‘Big One’,” 8/1/15), there’s a logical scientific basis for a major quake devastating areas along the Marikina Valley fault line, and we should be ready when it happens. But worrying about the disaster to no end will eventually cause us more damage than the actual disaster itself.

A reader from Quezon City, who requested not to be identified, said the “Big One” in Metro Manila is likely to happen on the week of Sept. 23, 2015, which coincides with the global cataclysmic events being circulated on the Internet.

500-day timeline

I believe all these predictions of an end-day scenario started on May 13, 2014, when French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said, during a White House press conference alongside US Secretary of State John Kerry, that the world has “500 days to avoid climate chaos.” The 500 days ends on Sept. 23, 2015.

Fabius didn’t really elaborate much on what he meant by climate chaos and where he got the 500-day timeline. He simply went on to say that he knows that US President Barack Obama and Kerry “are committed on this subject and I’m sure that with them, with a lot of other friends, we shall be able to reach success on this very important matter.”

Interpretations

This equivocal pronouncement opened the floodgates for all sorts of interpretations passed on either as prophesies or science-based predictions.

One prediction is that a huge 2.5-mile meteor or asteroid discovered on Sept. 11, 1969, is supposed to be on an ominous course and would likely hit Earth, specifically the Atlantic Ocean near the northeast coast of South America on Sept. 23 this year. With the magnitude of the impact, a calamitous tsunami is expected to wipe out cities or possibly countries along its course.

The doomsday prophets also say that the impact of the asteroid would be such that major faults like the San Andreas fault line in the United States’ West Coast and our own Marikina Valley fault line would also cause intensity 7 or stronger earthquakes, adding to the almost-global devastation.

The United Sates’ National Aeronautics and Space Administration denied any evidence supporting this doomsday forecast, stressing that such a catastrophic event is not even remotely possible. It has not charted any asteroid or comet which may be on a collision course with Earth. It reassured that as best as the agency’s scientists can tell, no large object is likely to strike Earth any time in the next several hundred years.

Our local experts at the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology also not made any statement supporting or encouraging this asteroid-collision theory triggering the dreaded “Big One” in our country.

Prevent widespread panic

So, whether our global experts and leaders are hiding vital information from us to prevent widespread panic, we don’t know. We just have to take their word that there’s no hard basis for all the apocalyptic predictions being circulated on the Internet.

Even the Bible has forewarned us that there will be many false prophets who would come, with deceitful stories to distract us and cause helplessness in everyone. As Christians, we believe that Jesus Christ will come again and it’s true the signs of the times (famines, wars, earthquakes, disease outbreaks, solar eclipses, etc.) are all around us, but He himself said, “No one knows the time or the hour,” and that “He will come like a thief in the night.”

Be spiritually prepared

So, more than the physical and mental preparation for the “Big One” and other cataclysmic events, we should also be spiritually prepared anytime. Meanwhile, we should go about our usual chores and be productively busy in making a difference, not only in our own lives, but in other people’s lives as well.

This way, we can look forward with eager anticipation, not with fear or panic, to any end-day prediction, as a glorious event for all the righteous and spiritually prepared to be brought to an indescribably beautiful place where there would be no more aches and pain, no more worries or fear, no sadness, no hunger, no corrupt politicians, no monstrous traffic jams, and everything meaninglessly mundane.