1. Parametric Data Collection from pre-WWSSN Seismological Bulletins
D. Di Giacomo, A. Villaseñor, J. Harris and D.A. Storchak 1

2. Background www.isc.ac.uk/iscgem/
The ISC and a Team of International Experts released in January 2013 the ISC-GEM catalogue ( ), which provides basic earthquake parameters (location, moment magnitude, and, if available, moment tensor) along with corresponding uncertainties. This product is unique since list parameters obtained using the same techniques (to the largest extent possible) throughout the last 110 years of instrumental seismology. or

3. Background
Given the time and resources in the project we processed only selected earthquakes using time-variable cut-off magnitudes:
M ≥ 7.5 up to 1917 (plus significant quakes in continental regions with M ≥ 6.5);
M ≥ 6.25 between 1918 and 1959;
M > 5.5 from 1960 onwards.
To process large earthquakes occurred in the last 100+ years we first had to digitize the necessary instrumental parametric data (hypocenters, magnitudes, phase time arrivals, amplitude and periods of different phases, etc.) in order to apply the same modern techniques we use for current earthquakes also to past ones.

4. Instrumental Data from Printed Seismological Bulletins
Body/Surface Wave Amplitudes
Body Wave Arrival Times
Period 1) 2)
DIGITALLY AVAILABLE, ISC database
DIGITALLY AVAILABLE, ISC database
Quality station bulletins
DIGITALLY NOT AVAILABLE BEFORE THIS PROJECT
Major Sources of Phase Data:
Gutenberg Notepads ( ) and BAAS ( ), ISA ( )
ISS Bulletins ( ) 4

5. Pre-ISS: Gutenberg notepads, BAAS and ISA bulletins
Gutenberg notepads, (pre-1913):
data digitized only for large earthquakes
ISA bulletins, : all earthquakes processed
BAAS bulletins, : all earthquakes processed

6. Processing ISS
ISS is a primary source of phase data for earthquakes occurred before digital era. Scans of all ISS pages are available from SISMOS. OCR technique has bee applied to the scans…

7. Processing ISS

8. Digitizing the ISS bulletins: status
Years
Status
Digitally available as FFB file, from the so-called “Shannon tape”
Partially available (Ms ≥ 7.0, Villaseñor&Engdahl, 2002; 6.2 < Ms < 7.0, Di Giacomo et al., 2014 ). About 2880 pages to be done.
Nearly complete (5000 pages done, about 1350 left)
Recently completed, digitally available as FFB file
Digitally available via the ISC website ( after the work by Villaseñor&Engdahl (2007)

9. ISS Station coverage, pre-1960
Di Giacomo et al., PEPI 2014

10. Phase and Amplitude Data Collection
Body/Surface Wave Amplitudes
Body Wave Arrival Times
Period
~10,000
~1,000,000
Quality station bulletins
DIGITALLY NOT AVAILABLE BEFORE THIS PROJECT
DIGITALLY AVAILABLE, ISC database
Major Sources of Phase Data:
Gutenberg Notepads ( ) and BAAS ( )
ISS Bulletins ( )
43rd Nordic Seismology Seminar, October 2012, Tallinn 10

11. Adding amplitudes from historical seismological bulletin
~15,000 individual seismic bulletins from 290 institutions over the period 1904 – 1970 were recovered from ISC storage

12. Adding amplitudes from historical seismological bulletin
1906 San Francisco earthquake report from Göttingen (Germany) station bulletin.
The same report stored in digital format in the ISC database. Period and amplitude data finally available for magnitude recomputation.

13. Station contributing with amplitudes in the current version pf the ISC-GEM catalogue
Storchak et al., SRL 2013

14. Amplitudes currently added for M<6
Amplitudes currently added for M<6.25 earthquakes in the ISS,

15. Location improvements
More details in Bondár et al., PEPI 2014

16. Improvements in magnitude, especially Ms
ISC-GEM recomputed Ms
Ms from Abe’s catalogue
More details in Di Giacomo et al., PEPI 2014

17. Summary
In order to produce the ISC-GEM catalogue, we digitized a multitude of sources of parametric seismological data to facilitate location and magnitude re-computation for earthquakes before 1960.
The parametric data collected in this project will be useful for any future study for earthquakes occurred in the pre-WWSSN period
Scans of the processed bulletins are available in PDF at SISMOS website:
Di Giacomo et al., PEPI 2014
Add bullet on the data collection, stress more all of them