Why Have There Already Been 23 Missouri Earthquakes in November?

This certainly got my attention. It's normal for southern Missouri to experience more than 20 earthquakes a month thanks to the always-active New Madrid Fault. I was very surprised to see that there have already been 23 felt in Missouri just in November and we're not even close to the end of the month.

I check the USGS earthquake page every day and I've noticed lately that nearly every time I look there's another New Madrid quake. I decided to query the USGS site and specifically ask it to show me only November quakes felt in Missouri and this is what it showed me. 23 November quakes in Missouri already.

These have not been all tiny quakes either. There was a magnitude 3.7 quake near Steele, Missouri on November 3 and a 3.2 magnitude quake near Caruthersville on November 16.

Are these forerunner quakes leading up to a larger event?

There's no way to know that. The USGS even says that you only know a quake is a foreshock after a larger quake happens. I've been fortunate to get to know some seismologists with the USGS over the years and I've learned they are necessarily conservative and non-sensational when it comes to analyzing earthquakes. They're not big fans of outrageous self-proclaimed experts tossing out predictions of big quakes based on occasional swarms.

I think that cautionary attitude is the right way to observe these swarms of mostly smaller New Madrid Fault quakes, but it's also a good idea to be aware of sudden upticks in activity in the event that something more significant happens. The activity in November in Missouri has certainly been interesting, but is no reason for alarm - yet.