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Question: What's the fastest earthquake notification source publicly available? I ask because USGS seems to have a 5-10 minute delay, whereas I'm hoping for les
by mehrdadn 7y ago
Question: What's the fastest earthquake notification source publicly available? I ask because USGS seems to have a 5-10 minute delay, whereas I'm hoping for less (ideally a few seconds).
- rolltiide 7y agoTwitter lol You just dont get magnitude, depth and location data You can also make your own seismoter, its not complicated but everything makes them go off
- King-Aaron 7y agoCompulsory XKCD: https://xkcd.com/723/ https://xkcd.com/723/
- daveslash 7y agoExcusing the commentor's misuse of grammar and punctuation: I'm Not sure why this comment is being down voted. I haven't done the research, but is @rolltide incorrect in his assertion that you can get certain data from USGS (such as magnitude, depth, and location)? That information is available on the USGS website. Or are people down-voting him/her because of the claim of making your own seismoter? (rolltitde did misspel seismometer).
- Dylan16807 7y agoFor one, twitter can't give you a notification for an earthquake.
- mkl 7y agoIt sounds like they just meant random people tweeting about earthquakes the moment they happen, instead of actual data or reliable notifications.
- vonmoltke 7y ago> Excusing the commentor's misuse of grammar and punctuation: I'm Not sure why this comment is being down voted. I downvoted it for "Twitter lol". 1) The "lol" is unnecessary and juvenile 2) The statement indicates that either using Twitter should somehow be obvious, or that the poster is not taking the posed question seriously On balance, it pulls the level of discourse down, which is my (and the proper) criteria for a downvote.
- Gibbon1 7y ago> I downvoted it for "Twitter lol". I would appreciate that you not censor other people comments over such trivial things. Because it's really annoying to everyone else. And thus rude.
- rolltiide 7y agoseems the consensus is that it's not inaccurate, they just didn't like the format of the contribution so you can learn a lot from downvote censored comments on this site
- mch82 7y ago@earthquakesLA is very quick to post info Edit: for example... “A 3.7 magnitude earthquake occurred 0mi WSW of Compton, CA. Details: http://eqbot.com/2iV http://eqbot.com/2iV Map: http://eqbot.com/2ii” http://eqbot.com/2ii”
- de_watcher 7y agoI've got the googley eyes seismometer on my fridge.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- mike_d 7y agoThe newly updated MyShake app detects seismic events using peoples cell phones, then sends notifications to people nearby 5-10 seconds before the shock waves arrive. https://myshake.berkeley.edu/ https://myshake.berkeley.edu/
- mehrdadn 7y agoThanks, but oh man... I've tried this a year or two ago, but I was hoping there would be something that wouldn't require my phone to have constant data connectivity? I turn it off sometimes especially at home/work. :\ Edit: I'm also not sure how much battery it uses... hopefully the battery-saver mode won't use much?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- cortesoft 7y agoHaha, well we just had an earthquake a few minutes ago here in Los Angeles. It was up on Reddit /r/losangeles within a few seconds.
- malingo 7y agoYep, just woke me up. Here's the seismograph from Occidental college: https://apps.oxy.edu/ws/seismoday.aspx https://apps.oxy.edu/ws/seismoday.aspx
- tyfon 7y agoWouldn't SMS fit the bill? Everyone has it and it's quick to send out if you have the system set up for it.
- tapland 7y agoYes, as a system for publishing. But it's only a way to transfer the notification, not a source.
- mehrdadn 7y agoSMS isn't a notification source, it's a communication medium.
- capableweb 7y ago> HTTP isn't a notification source, it's a communication medium. > WebSockets isn't a notification source, it's a communication medium. > Email isn't a notification source, it's a communication medium. Seems like sometimes communication mediums are being used as notification sources. And that's fine.
- tyfon 7y agoIt's used for urgent notification of the public by the Norwegian government and municipalities. It's also very easy to accurately target specific areas as all the numbers are registered with the address of the owner. The benefit is that you don't need any infrastructure except for the phone network so there are very few servers that can go down etc. Edit: I see my error!, Yes it's not a source. Never mind my comments :)
- Florin_Andrei 7y agoThe Earthquake Alert! app on Android showed me the recent earthquake about 1 minute after the event - the time it took to figure out what's happening, get the phone, unlock, fire up the app, etc.
- moring 7y agoSounds like room for improvement: Shout "earthquake" through the phone's speakers (overriding any volume setting), flash "earthquake" on the screen (turning the screen on if necessary, but if that takes a second, don't have it delay the sound output but do it in parallel), and especially without unlocking or opening the app.
- themaninthedark 7y agoSomething like this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKhFCMO78OE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKhFCMO78OE
- spuz 7y agoWhy do you need to fire up the app? Are you looking to receive alerts or send them?
- elorant 7y agoI live in Greece and often I check: https://www.emsc-csem.org/Earthquake/ https://www.emsc-csem.org/Earthquake/ It appears to have quite immediate reporting, in the region of couple of minutes.
- cookie_monsta 7y agoI'm not meaning to be obtuse and I've only experienced a few earthquakes first-hand, but why would you need a near real-time notification? It's kind of obvious when one is happening in your vicinity and if it's not nearby why would the delay matter?
- mehrdadn 7y agoOne reason is that I've noticed sometimes it takes me a few seconds to be able to tell if it's genuinely an earthquake or if something else is causing a vibration, and sometimes it actually takes a few seconds for it to become noticeable... then a few seconds on top of that for me to figure out how to react. Any kind of confirmation notification at that point would be extremely helpful to snap me into action and avoid needless delays. Another reason is that, well, I might be asleep, and ideally I'd prefer to wake up with a notification, rather than (say) with something falling on my head...
- thinkingemote 7y ago1) Tsunami early warning system. The difference of 30 seconds might be enough to save a life. 5-10 minutes might save many more? 2) Stabilize machinery, close windows, blinds, turn off gas, start emergency generator in hospital. I'm sure the financial people would be able to sell stocks with earlier notice than others!
- kalleboo 7y agoThe real-time notifications to cell phones in Japan are faster than the actual seismic waves, so if it's a decently sized earthquake a little ways away, it gives you a 5-15 second head start
- m4rtink 7y agoShinkansens apply full breaks automatically if dangerous earthquake is detected (there are about 50 on the way just between Osaka and Tokyo). Thanks to this system many trainsets will already be stationary when the seismic waves hit them.
- dheera 7y agoI was also hoping to create an early warning system and at least wake me out of bed a few seconds before an earthquake hits so I'm at least on the way to sheltering myself from falling objects. The response I got from USGS was this: > You can read our FAQ on that at https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/how-fast-does-earthquake-information-get-posted-web-site-get-sent-out-earthquake-notification https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/how-fast-does-earthquake-informati.... > You may also be interested in ShakeAlert - see https://earthquake.usgs.gov/research/earlywarning/ https://earthquake.usgs.gov/research/earlywarning/. So in short, no, they don't really have it yet. I wonder though if we (hackers) could create a realtime system for the bay area since USGS has been on it for years without results. About 20-50 sensors scattered in homes around the bay would probably be enough for an early warning system. Warnings can be delivered via a mobile app, or some kind of realtime API that anyone can use for their own purposes (e.g. stopping machinery, sounding building alarms, ...).
- mehrdadn 7y agoThanks! It's nice to see someone finally address my question head-on. I feel the same way as you -- I can't fathom why it's taking them so long. Sad to hear nothing exists yet, but glad it's not just me being unable to find something.
- semi-extrinsic 7y agoIf you want to do this, look to Japan. I'm not working in this field, but I know they put a lot of effort into not just the geology, but also the psychology of warnings, esp. compared to acceptable false positive rates.
- axus 7y agoThey were able to warn everyone in real-time when North Korea launched those missiles. A quick search turned up this article that the J-Alert system is not perfect: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/04/10/national/japans-vaunted-quake-missile-alert-system-runs-limits/#.Xam_uOhKhaQ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/04/10/national/japans...
- Excel_Wizard 7y ago
- tlrobinson 7y agoTwitter. Seriously. If you can get a real-time feed of all tweets with the word “earthquake” it should be pretty easy to detect all ~4+ magnitude earthquakes in (moderately? heavily?) populated areas.
- Cshelton 7y agoExactly. And Twitter is also in the best position to build a dedicated alert system since many times they have the mobile location of each user tweeting. They could even have the app tell the user to then set the phone on a flat surface and use that to try and crowdsource a magnitude/validate the quake. I don't think any other company/org is in a position to be even remotely as accurate than Twitter is for real-time.
- rightbyte 7y agoIf a bad enough erathquake hit the network would probably malfunction or overload due to distress and "are you OK" calls. I guess there is need for satelite or some long wave RF system.
- fragmede 7y agoYesterday, on the anniversary of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, they tested out an early warning system hooked up to the system that drives Amber alerts. This will deliver warning of an impending earthquake, tens of seconds before an earthquake hits (in supported areas, like SF) due to the propagation speed differences between an earthquake's P-wave and S-waves. (Japan has had such a system in place since the 90's, and will stop bullet trains and surgeries just before the earthquake hits.)
- Decade 7y agoMy phone got the alert half an hour after the advertised alert window (advertised: 5:15 to 5:45, actual: 6:15), so that’s not great.
- alikim 7y agoI wrote a script that monitors twitter for earthquake related tweets and notifies me when a certain threshold is hit. It pretty reliably notifies me 20-30s post-quake. Main problem is that very few tweets actually have location data associated with them. I try to grab the location string users can specify in their bio and infer the location based on the most common occurrence in a body of tweets- works decently well although its usually a broader region.
- Cerium 7y agoUsually I see the earthquake on the USGS recent earthquake feed within a minute of feeling the event.
- pkaye 7y agoCalifornia has a earthquake warning system they started just publicizing. http://earthquake.ca.gov/mobile-application/ http://earthquake.ca.gov/mobile-application/ Its been a few years in the making. Also it will give warnings only if close to your proximity by cellular location.