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Rapid assessment of an earthquake’s impact on the affected society is a crucial first step of disaster management, determining further emergency measures. We demonstrate that macroseismic observations, collected as felt reports via the LastQuake service of the European Mediterranean Seismological Center, can be utilized to estimate the probability of a felt earthquake to have a “high impact” rather than a “low impact” on the affected population on a global scale. In our fully data-driven, transparent, and reproducible approach we compare the distribution of felt reports to documented earthquake impact in terms of economic losses, number of fatalities, and number of damaged or destroyed buildings. Using the distribution of felt-reports as predictive parameters and an impact measure as the target parameter, we infer a probabilistic model utilizing Bayes’ theorem and Kernel Density Estimation, that provides the probability of an earthquake to be “high impact”. For 393 felt events in 2021, a sufficient number of felt reports to run the model is collected within 10 minutes after the earthquake. While a clean separation of “high-impact” and “low-impact” events remains a challenging task, unambiguous identification of many “low-impact” events in our dataset is identified as a key strength of our approach. We consider our method a complementary and inexpensive impact assessment tools, that can be utilized instantly in all populated areas on the planet, with the necessary technological infrastructure. Being fully independent of seismic data, our framework poses an affordable option to support disaster management in regions that currently lack expensive seismic instrumentation., The 28th IUGG General Assembly (IUGG2023) (Berlin 2023)

This paper presents a joint analysis of instrumental and macroseismic data regarding the 19 July 2019, Greece Mw5.1 earthquake occurred west of Athens. This earthquake ruptured a blind, south-dipping normal fault, 23 km WNW of the center of Athens, while its relocated epicentre lies in close vicinity to the one of the 1999 Mw6.0 earthquake. The maximum macroseismic intensity of the 2019 mainshock reached IEMS98 = 7.5. Scarce damage and intensities up to 5–6 were reported in the epicentral area. Higher intensities were observed at larger distances, 12–15 km east and ESE of the epicentre, alongside the banks of Kifissos River, likely related to ground motion amplification due to soft alluvial formations. Similar selectivity of increased ground motions to the east of the epicentre with respect to other azimuths, also observed during the 1981 and 1999 earthquakes, supports eastward rupture directivity of the 2019 mainshock, an effect that is possibly common for the region’s fault system. Damping of seismic effects was observed east of Aegaleo Mountain, a structure suggested to impose a stopping phase in the time histories of the 1999 and 2019 earthquakes (Fig. A1). © 2021, The Author(s).

A network of "personal seismometers" is intended to complement Haiti's national seismic network to engage and inform residents about earthquake hazards and preparation.

International audience; Summary LastQuake is a multichannel (websites, Twitter and Telegram quakebots, smartphone app) real time information system developed by the European Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC), one of the top global earthquake information centre and targeting eyewitnesses. Based on visual communication, LastQuake informs in real time eyewitnesses on earthquakes and their effects, massively crowdsource their experiences (felt reports, geo-located pics, open comments) and offers geo-targeted safety tips immediately after violent shaking. We show how these affordable and standard Internet and smartphone technologies fulfill eyewitnesses' needs during earthquake emergencies and how they complement existing strategies for contributing to immediate reduction of seismic risk at global scale; LastQuake est un système multicanal (sites Internet, robot de publication Twitter et Telegram, application smartphone) d'information sismologique en temps réel à destination du public développé par le Centre Sismologique Euro-Méditerranéen (CSEM), un des principaux centres d'information sismologique au monde. Basé sur la communication visuelle, LastQuake informe ses utilisateurs sur les séismes et leurs effets, collecte massivement leur témoignages et, en cas de violente séisme, leur indique les comportements à privilégier et éviter immédiatement après la secousse. Nous montrons comment ces outils numériques simples et bon marché répondent à un besoin des citoyens et peuvent contribuer, en complément des stratégies existantes à la réduction du risque sismique global.

Within the EPOS Research Infrastructure initiative, the international European coordination of the seismological research infrastructure is coordinated through ORFEUS (www.orfeus-eu.org) and considerable assistance from EMSC (www.emsc-csem.org). A newly installed EPOS working group 1 ensure a coordinated engagement of all involved seismological research infrastructures. We are working on a comprehensive overview of the seismological observational networks and research infrastructure within Europe and its direct periphery. We will present this overview, its current capabilities and future potential as a coordinated infrastructure. In the past year a number of different projects and initiatives have been launched to investigate new IT developments and its opportunities for improved data services, quality control, data integration and interoperability. Specifically developments include web-services, distributed archives, real-time data exchange software, data curation, data provenance, quality control, etc. EC-projects like NERA, VERCE, EUDAT, ENVRI, COOPEUS, REAKT, but also a large number of national initiatives have obtained funding. We will provide an overview of their activities and their potential impact on the seismological research infrastructure. We will also present the challenges involved in coordinating and implementing these different IT initiatives. The seismological research infrastructure involves a widely diverse set of observational networks; broadband seismic networks, local specialised monitoring networks, mobile deployments, acceleration networks, borehole observations, near source observational networks, etc, divided over many countries. We will present an overview of these networks, and the initiatives and challenges to integrate these data and facilitate access for research. Consequently, we will present a comprehensive overview of the current seismological observatories and research infrastructure within Europe, its developments and its potential. We hope this overview triggers a debate on how to make full advantage of these research infrastructures and where near time development priorities should be.

The Network of Research Infrastructures for European Seismology (NERIES) is European Commission (EC) project whose focus is networking together seismological observatories and research institutes into one integrated European infrastructure that provides access to data and data products for research. Seismological institutes and organizations in European and Mediterranean countries maintain large, geographically distributed data archives, therefore this scenario suggested a design approach based on the concept of an internet service oriented architecture (SOA) to establish a cyberinfrastructure for distributed and heterogeneous data streams and services. Moreover, one of the goals of NERIES is to design and develop a Web portal that acts as the uppermost layer of the infrastructure and provides rendering capabilities for the underlying sets of data. The Web services that are currently being designed and implemented will deliver data that has been adopted to appropriate formats. The parametric information about a seismic event is delivered using a seismology-specific Extensible mark-up Language(XML) format called QuakeML (https://quake.ethz.ch/quakeml), which has been formalized and implemented in coordination with global earthquake-information agencies. Uniform Resource Identifiers (URIs) are used to assign identifiers to (1) seismic-event parameters described by QuakeML, and (2) generic resources, for example, authorities, locations providers, location methods, software adopted, and so on, described by use of a data model constructed with the resource description framework (RDF) and accessible as a service. The European-Mediterranean Seismological Center (EMSC) has implemented a unique event identifier (UNID) that will create the seismic event URI used by the QuakeML data model. Access to data such as broadband waveform, accelerometric data and stations inventories will be also provided through a set of Web services that will wrap the middleware used by the seismological observatory or institute that is supplying the data. Each single application of the portal consists of a Java-based JSR-168-standard portlet (often provided with interactive maps for data discovery). In specific cases, it will be possible to distribute the deployment of the portlets among the data providers, such as seismological agencies, because of the adoption, within the distributed architecture of the NERIES portal of the Web Services for Remote Portlets (WSRP) standard for presentation-oriented web services The purpose of the portal is to provide to the user his own environment where he can surf and retrieve the data of interest, offering a set of shopping carts with storage and management facilities. This approach involves having the user interact with dedicated tools in order to compose personalized datasets that can be downloaded or combined with other information available either through the NERIES network of Web services or through the user‘s own carts. Administrative applications also are provided to perform monitoring tasks such as retrieving service statistics or scheduling submitted data requests. An administrative tool is included that allows the RDF model to be extended, within certain constraints, with new classes and properties.

National audience

To study the seismicity associated to the Ibero-Maghrebian region, the Real Instituto y Observatorio de la Armada in San Fernando (ROA) has installed, since 1898, different types of seismological stations. At present two networks are in operation: Long Period station and Short Period net (ROA) and Western Mediterranean Broad Band (WM) net (in collaboration among several institutions). The installation of a network of ocean-bottom seismographs (FOMAR) is underway. The Ibero- Maghrebian region corresponds to the western part of the Eurasia-Africa plate boundary and is of great seismological and tectonic interest. It extends from 12oW to 3oE, comprising Southern Iberia and northern Africa, including the Gulf of Cadiz and Alboran Sea (figure 1). Seismicity is characterized by the occurrence of moderate and large magnitude earthquakes at shallow depth, intermediate depth earthquakes (30

The workshop “Earthquake monitoring and Earthquake Risk in WEstern Mediterranean” (EERWEM) will summarize the current knowledge, on-going projects and research plans with regard to seismic activity and risk in the region. This work is organized in two topics: i) presentation of our current research on seismic activity and earthquake risk in the Western Mediterranean region, particularly in Portugal and ii) a short training course about seismic data processing and waveform analysis. Some applications based on broad band teleseismic wave form will be presented using software currently available on the internet sites. Ongoing research projects within the group will be presented and discussed. Some preliminary results will be shown, in particular for the following research topics: i) Seismic Tomography of the Continental Lithosphere of Algarve (Portugal); ii) Finite seismic source modelization and strong motion prediction in Portugal and iii) the University of EVOra (UEVO) Broad Band seismic station (STS2) and upcoming temporary broad band network.

Portugal, in spite of the significant earthquake region, (e.g.: Borges et al., 2001) has been operating a limited number of broadband digital seismic instruments. The older BB seismic station in a systematic and continuous operation on the country is MTE, belonging to GEOFON and locally supported by IM, which is working since 1997. To efficiently carry out the task of develop the Broadband Portuguese seismic network, there is a collaboration between some national institutions, such as Institute of Meteorology (IM), Geophysics Center of Évora University (CGE/UE), Geophysics Center of University of Lisbon (CGUL/IGIDL) and Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), with governmental support from the National Science and Technology Foundation (Rede Nacional de Geofísica, RNG). From this collaboration we expect shortly to assist the emergence of a high quality infrastructure, significant to real-time monitoring the earthquake activity for use by governmental authorities, and of paramount importance to scientific research. The installation of this network is to be carried out in narrow connection with international institutions as GEOFON, EMSC, ROA, ORFEUS, with who we saw to establish collaborations. Data from some stations are already being exported to international data centers, such as DMC and ORFEUS, and will be used for an upcoming prototype of an Early Warning Tsunami System to be developed for Cadiz Gulf coastal area and southwestern coasts of Portugal mainland, within the framework of the NEAREST project. Conclusions While the broadband network is developed they elapse investigation projects that request short period data. Of these projects we highlight the Seismic Tomography of the Continental Lithosphere of Algarve (Portugal) that involve the installation of a Portable seismic network consisting of 30 short- period stations, including a subnet of 7 telemetry stations, in operation since January 2006

An event of magnitude Mw 6.1(EMSC) occurred on 12/02/2007 at 10:35 UTC off coast of South-Western Portugal. The earthquake had its epicentre in the eastern Horseshoe Abyssal Plain, at 175 km South-West of San Vicente Cape (Figure 1). This earthquake is the largest earthquake since the great instrumental earthquake, Ms=8.0 (USGS), occurred on February 28th, 1969 in the same epicentral area. This earthquake was followed by four small aftershocks with magnitude less or equal to 3.5. There has been no reported damage associated to the event since habitated regions are too far away from the epicentre. This event has been widely felt in Portugal, particularly in the Algarve Region (I=IV – IM information), Southern Spain and Western Morocco and up to 700 km away of the epicentre (Salamanca, Madrid) (EMSC report in http://www.emsc-csem.org).