According to George Choy, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey, Oklahoma has had a severe spike in earthquakes of 3.0 magnitude or higher since 2008. The number of 3.0 magnitude quakes rose from 2 in 2008 to 889 in 2015, according to USGS statistics. In 2016, there have been 572 (up to November). "The oil companies have said for a long time that these are natural earthquakes, that they would have occurred anyway," Choy said, "but when you look at the statistics, that argument does not fly."