The U.S. Geological Survey Earthquake Hazards Program Website: Summary of Recent and Ongoing Developments
Abstract
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Earthquake Hazards Program (EHP) website (http://earthquake.usgs.gov/) focuses on 1) earthquake reporting for informed decisions after an earthquake, 2) hazards information for informed decisions and planning before an earthquake, and 3) the basics of earthquake science to help the users of the information understand what is presented. The majority of website visitors are looking for information about current earthquakes in the U.S. and around the world, and the second most visited portion of the website are the education-related pages. People are eager for information, and they are most interested in "what's in my backyard?" Recent and future web developments are aimed at answering this question, making the information more relevant to users, and enabling users to more quickly and easily find the information they are looking for. Recent and/or current web developments include the new enhanced Recent Global Earthquakes and U.S. Earthquakes webpages, the Earthquake in the News system, the Rapid Accurate Tectonic Summaries (RATS), online Significant Earthquake Summary Posters (ESP's), and the U.S. Quaternary Fault & Fold Database, the details of which are covered individually in greater detail in this or other sessions. Future planned developments include a consistent look across all EHP webpages, an integrated one-stop-shopping earthquake notification (EQMail) subscription webpage, new navigation tabs, and a backend database allowing the user to search for earthquake information across all the various EHP websites (on different webservers) based on a topic or region. Another goal is to eventually allow a user to input their address (Zip Code?) and in return receive all the relevant EHP information (and links to more detailed information) such as closest fault, the last significant nearby earthquake, a local seismicity map, and a local hazard map, for example. This would essentially be a dynamic report based on the entered location. This type of "what's in my backyard?" information would be of great benefit to both various organizations, such as insurance agencies and building contractors, and the general public.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2003
- Bibcode:
- 2003AGUFMED32C1220W
- Keywords:
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- 6605 Education;
- 7223 Seismic hazard assessment and prediction;
- 7230 Seismicity and seismotectonics;
- 7299 General or miscellaneous