Automated processing of the 2019 Ridgecrest, California, earthquake sequence ground motions

Eric M. Thompson, Mike Hearne, John Rekoske, Heather Schovanec, Morgan P. Moschetti, Brad T. Aagaard, & Grace A. Parker

Published August 15, 2019, SCEC Contribution #9838, 2019 SCEC Annual Meeting Poster #250

We describe ongoing efforts at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to develop automated open-source ground motion processing software. Within the USGS, numerous projects have highlighted the need for standardized and automated ground-motion processing algorithms, including basic seismological research, analysis by the USGS National Seismic Hazard Model Project, and operational systems such as ShakeMap. We expect that the software will be of value to the broader engineering seismology community, and we seek to include ongoing developments in processing algorithms by groups outside of the USGS. The software is written in Python, is built on the open source ObsPy library, and incorporates methods developed for the USGS Processing and Review Interface for Strong Motion Data (PRISM). To facilitate data collection, the software reads a range of diverse file formats including any format supported by ObsPy and many formats available from the Center for Engineering Strong Motion Data (CESMD). In this presentation, we describe the ground-motion processing software, demonstrate its capabilities, present validation efforts that compare our results to those from the Next Generation Attenuation West 2 project, and describe the results of using this software to compile and process records for the 2019 Ridgecrest, California, earthquake sequence. This dataset includes more than 50 events of M4 or greater, and more than 16000 records.

Citation
Thompson, E. M., Hearne, M., Rekoske, J., Schovanec, H., Moschetti, M. P., Aagaard, B. T., & Parker, G. A. (2019, 08). Automated processing of the 2019 Ridgecrest, California, earthquake sequence ground motions. Poster Presentation at 2019 SCEC Annual Meeting.

Related Projects & Working Groups
Ridgecrest Earthquakes