The EarthScope USArray Array Network Facility (ANF): Metadata, Network and Data Monitoring, Quality Assurance During the Third Year of Operations

During the third year of operations, the Array Network Facility (ANF) for the EarthScope USArray Transportable Array seismic network has continued the timely delivery of metadata and waveform data from the growing number of Transportable Array stations. The network has nearly doubled in size over the last year to 233 stations with 170 out of the 400 new TA sites installed (as of September 2006). Use of the Antelope software package has allowed us to maintain and operate such a dynamic network configuration, facilitating the collection and transfer of data, the generation and merging of the metadata as well as the real-time monitoring of state of health of TA station data-loggers and their command and control. Currently four regional networks (Anza, BDSN, SCSN, and UNR) as well as the USNSN contribute data to the Transportable Array with additional contributions expected from UUSS and the Montana Regional Seismic Network. Although the real- time data flow to the IRIS DMC has been consistently above 90% in the last year, the ANF has strived to recover the remaining 10% of data to the DMC by connecting to a data storage device (Baler) at each station to generate day long seed files: automation of this process is ongoing. The results of this process will be presented. Operation of the USArray at the ANF has benefited by the real-time interface with the ORB and the Datascope database using PHP for display on the ANF website (http://anf.ucsd.edu). A recent feature in the website is station grouping, by communication provider, network, and equipment deployed at each site that helps to diagnose and reduce response time to operational problems. Information available for all stations includes: location, maps, photographs, equipment deployed, communications, distribution of events recorded by each station, and displays of daily, weekly, and monthly station noise spectra as generated by the DMC is also available. Analyst review of automatic locations for the USArray network are being done in quasi real-time at the ANF to monitor data quality. All events are associated with the USGS and regional network bulletins. We find a small percentage of events that cannot be associated with existing bulletins. The pick information generated at the ANF for all USArray stations is made available as a basic product to the scientific community and regional data centers. As of September 2006, an average of 10,000 weekly picks are being generated by analysts at the ANF.