Obtaining Earthquake Hypocenter Information Electronically

Earthquake hypocenter information can be obtained electronically in several ways:

via "finger servers"

via the world wide web (WWW)

via public telnet accounts to various locations

via routine e-mail mailings

FINGER SERVERS

A good listing of current global seismicity can be obtained by using the command:

finger quake@gldfs.cr.usgs.gov

Detailed information about the "quake" finger server, as well as numerous other earthquake finger servers, can be obtained by using the command:

finger qk info@gldfs.cr.usgs.gov

WWW SITES

Here are two sites which frequently update maps of regional and global seismicity:

The USGS National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colorado--for definitive maps of current and historical global seismicity

The USGS Menlo Park, California office--for a variety of maps and further links for regional seismicity

An excellent place to begin a WWW seach for all manner of earthquake and earth science information is Steve Malone's Seismo-Surfing Page

TELNET SITES

A good telnet site for recent earthquake information is Quick Epicenter Determinations (QED). To access the QED, use the command:

telnet neis.cr.usgs.gov

Use "qed" as the login name (no password is required) then follow the on-line directions.

E-MAIL MAILING LISTS

The USGS National Earthquake Information Center (NEIC)  has various automated mailing lists for distributing earthquake hypocenter information on various time schedules. In addition, summary catalogs of hypocenters are available via e-mail or anonymous FTP. A good way to subscribe to the NEIC's general-purpose e-mail earthquake list is to use this subscription form at USGS Headquarters. However, more detailed information on the full range of earthquake e-mail list services can be found in the text below, which was provided by the NEIC (or you can get more details at the NEIC website .)

Information provided by the NEIC--

We have 2 automated mailing lists here at USGS/NEIC-- QEDPOST and BIGQUAKE . QEDPOST sends a daily message of the earthquakes located 7 days behind the current day taken from our Quick Epicenter Determinations listing. It is our most preliminary publication and typically contains 10-20 events per day. BIGQUAKE sends a message whenever a large earthquake release is issued (the criteria varies depending on the location of the event). Generally, we try to locate quakes larger than magnitude 5.5 within a day of the event. Quakes larger than 6.5 are located within a few hours of the event.

To subscribe, please visit the following site:

http://neic.usgs.gov/neis/data_services/data_services.html (to get on QEDPOST and BIGQUAKE)

The weekly PDE is not distributed to the general public--only to data contributors in paper format and to such and the scientific community in electronic form. Most commonly, we distribute the EHDF machine-readable format. At this time, there is the possibility that we will eliminate the weekly PDE due to staffing limitations. There is a good possibility this will occur within the next 2 years.

The monthly PDE is distributed in paper and diskette form through open-file reports as well as the phase data EDR. They are provided free to data contributors at present. The EHDF form of the monthly is available through anonymous ftp to gldfs.cr.usgs.gov (cd pde)  as the monthlies are completed (which is a slow process these days). The machine-readable version of the EDR is in the subdirectory edr (cd edr)   in standard UNIX compressed form. Since NEIC began publishing Mw magnitudes in 1994, I have gone back to 1990 in reproducing these files so that all applicable events have the Mw magnitudes in the monthly on-line files. I also changed the older Seattle Mc (coda length)  magnitude types to MD. Other than that, the pre-1994 files are essentially the same as those originally distributed. E-mail distribution requests for the PDE publications must be sent to sedas@neis.cr.usgs.gov. Recipients are registered in a separate file and are expected to notify us of address changes promptly.

End of information provided by the NEIC