Data Services Products: ESEC Exotic Seismic Events Catalog

Exotic seismic sources are non-earthquake seismic sources such as landslides, debris flows, dam collapses, floods, and avalanches that generate seismic signals but are rarely included in common earthquake catalogs. The seismic signals associated with such events contain valuable information about the source time function, energy, and sequence of events that is often not available from other sources.

The Exotic Seismic Events Catalog (ESEC) data product provides access to source parameter data such as location, and time of the event along with a selection of source-specific parameters for non-earthquake seismic sources that could help to accelerate research in the area of environmental seismology.

The ESEC originated as a database with events located solely in North America (Allstadt, McVey, and Malone, 2017) but now contains over 200 events spanning North America, Europe, and the Pacific Islands with the addition of a new data release by Collins and others (2022) and several individual events contributed by other researchers. New entries will be added to the database as information regarding new recent and historic events becomes available. The catalog is searchable and accessible via IRIS Searchable Product Depository (SPUD). SPUD provides a user interface that allows refinement of source selection parameters and provides a detail page displaying event information along with selected images, maps, links, references and links to all associated materials. Besides pointers to seismic and infrasound data at the DMC, the catalog entries also include simple downloadable text files and associated, source-specific, data such as images (maps, diagrams, photos), GIS files (imagery, shapefiles of outlines). The fundamental source information includes source type, location, and time of the event along with a selection of source-specific parameters (e.g., drop height, runout length, volume).

To cite the source of ESEC (Exotic Seismic Events Catalog) events :

• Citation information for individual ESEC (Exotic Seismic Events Catalog) events can be found in the Source(s) field of the Event pane for each event.

• Most events come from these two USGS data releases:
  • Allstadt, K.E., McVey, B.G., and Malone, S.D., 2017, Seismogenic landslides, debris flows, and outburst floods in the western United States and Canada from 1977 to 2017: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/F7251H3W.
  • Collins, E.A., Allstadt, K.E., Groult, C., Hibert, C., Malet, J.-P., Toney, L.D., and Bessette-Kirton, E.K., 2022, Seismogenic Landslides and other Mass Movements: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/P90VGCSK.

To cite the ESEC Data Product:

• Manochehr Bahavar, Kate E. Allstadt, Mick Van Fossen, Stephen D. Malone, Chad Trabant; Exotic Seismic Events Catalog (ESEC) Data Product. Seismological Research Letters ; 90 (3): 1355–1363. https://doi.org/10.1785/0220180402

DOI for this page:

• https://doi.org/10.17611/DP/ESEC.1

To cite the IRIS DMC Data Products effort:

• Hutko, A. R., M. Bahavar, C. Trabant, R. T. Weekly, M. Van Fossen, T. Ahern (2017), Data Products at the IRIS‐DMC: Growth and Usage, Seismological Research Letters, 88, no. 3, https://doi.org/10.1785/0220160190.

• Kate Allstadt (USGS)
• Brennah McVey (USGS)
• Steve Malone (PNSN)
• Elaine Collins (USGS)
• Charlotte Groult (U. of Strasbourg)
• Chément Hibert (U. of Strasbourg)
• Jean-Philippe Malet (U. of Strasbourg)
• Liam Toney (USGS)
• Erin Bessette-Kirton (U. of Utah)

2017-12-12

Released

2022-04-21

Major update