Preliminary Results of an Earthquake Early Warning System in Costa Rica

Abstract

We analyze the performance of a prototype earthquake early warning system deployed at the National Seismological Network of Costa Rica in collaboration with the Swiss Seismological Service by presenting the real-time performance during six earthquakes (Mw 5.1-6.4) that took place during 2018 and 2019. We observe that, despite only limited efforts to optimize the existing network of 158 stations, for EEW purposes, the network density allows fast determination of source parameters using both the Virtual Seismologist and the Finite Fault Rupture Detector algorithms. Shallow earthquakes on or near-shore are routinely identified within 11–20 s of their occurrence. The warning times for the capital city of San Jose are of 43 s for epicenters located at 220 km, like for the Mw 6.4 Armuelles earthquake. On the other hand, during the time analyzed, the EEW system did not provide positive warning times for earthquakes at distances less than 40 km from San Jose. Even though large (Mw > 7) distant historical earthquakes have not caused heavy damage in San Jose, there is potential for developing an EEW system for Costa Rica, especially for the purposes of rapid earthquake notifications, disaster response management, and seismic risk mitigation.

Uttarakhand State Earthquake Early Warning System: A Case Study of Himalayan Environment

“…EEW systems are operational in select countries and regions, such as Japan [63,64], Taiwan [65][66][67], Mexico [54,68,69], South Korea [70] issue nationwide warnings, meaning alerts are broadcast to the entire public. While some countries issue region-specific warnings, as seismic vulnerability is localized to certain areas, such as Anatolia in Turkey [71,72], Southwest Iberia [73][74][75], Southern Italy [76][77][78], Vrancea-Romania [79][80][81], China [82,83], Chili [84], Costa Rica [85,86], Switzerland [87], Nicaragua [88], Israel [89,90] and United States of America [56,91]. As the advancement of the EEW system is pivotal for reducing seismic risk, enhancing its capacity to offer more lead time is equally imperative [92].…”

Uttarakhand State Earthquake Early Warning System: A Case Study of the Himalayan Environment

“…EEW systems are operational in specific countries like Japan [ 18 , 19 ], Taiwan [ 20 , 21 , 22 ], Mexico [ 9 , 23 , 24 ], and South Korea [ 25 ], issuing nationwide warnings that cover a significant portion of the public. However, some countries issue region-specific warnings due to localized seismic vulnerability in certain areas, such as Anatolia in Turkey [ 26 , 27 ], Southwest Iberia [ 28 , 29 , 30 ], Southern Italy [ 31 , 32 , 33 ], Vrancea in Romania [ 34 , 35 , 36 ], Beijing in China [ 37 , 38 ], Chile [ 39 ], Costa Rica [ 40 , 41 ], Switzerland [ 42 ], Nicaragua [ 43 ], Israel [ 44 , 45 ], and the West Coast of the United States of America [ 11 , 46 ]. The advancement of EEW systems is pivotal for reducing seismic risk however enhancing the capacity to provide more lead time is equally essential [ 12 ].…”

Earthquake Early Warning in Central America: The Societal Perspective

“…Since 2016, the Swiss Seismological Service (SED) at ETH Zurich, with the financial support of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), has been collaborating with national seismological agencies in Nicaragua (INETER), Costa Rica (OVSICORI-UNA), El Salvador (MARN), and Guatemala (INSIVUMEH) to develop national EEW systems across Central America. A moderate investment in instrumentation has enhanced the EEW capability of the seismic networks and at this stage, satisfactory performance in terms of accuracy and latency of alerts is being achieved [12,13]. Public EEW alerts have recently been made available via a mobile phone application in Costa Rica and Nicaragua.…”