Subject:
         Great leap forward in ground motion
   Date:
         Tue, 06 Jun 2000 10:56:45 -0600
   From:
         Edward Cranswick 
     To:
         zoback@........




Mary Lou-
    Your excellent presentation yesterday about new approaches to ground

motion data acquisition -- particularly the idea of a 3-d accelerometer
on every PC CPU chip -- contained the most innovative and pro-active
notions about the ways the community can sense the Earth that I have
heard in the last decade. I am interested to see where you go with this
enthusiasm.
-Edward

--
Edward Cranswick                Tel: 303-273-8609
US Geological Survey, MS 966    Fax: 303-273-8600
PO Box 25046, Federal Center    cranswick@........
Denver, CO 80225-0046  USA      E.M. Forster said, "Only connect".





--
Edward Cranswick                Tel: 303-273-8609
US Geological Survey, MS 966    Fax: 303-273-8600
PO Box 25046, Federal Center    cranswick@........
Denver, CO 80225-0046  USA      E.M. Forster said, "Only connect".

Hi all,

Thought I would pass along the following info I sent to Jim Davis (CA State
Geologist) and Dick McCarthy (Exec Director, CA State Seismic Safety
Commission).  As most of you know, we have been working with these guys
(and others) to push through a CA state bill to support earthquake studies
to the tune of $15-20M/year.  Part of these $$ would go to monitoring and
could respresent a significant CA cost-share for ANSS (~$6M/yr).

In trying to sell this bill, there has always been the question of what is
the state paying for, or why does the state need to pay if the feds will do
it?  As explained below, I think we may have a hook that would represent
clear benefit to the state and which they might be interested in
funding--one could easily imagine all sorts of colateral educational
benefits.  What do you think?

cheers,
Mary Lou

Hi Jim and Dick,

At Assemblywoman Ellen Corbett's invitation, I spoke last Friday at a
public hearing she held in Hayward on Eq Safety and Preparedness in CA
schools.  I was asked to speak about eq probabilities on the Hayward, but I
broadened my talk to the entire Bay area with a focus on Hayward--to make
the point that no place is safe and that eqs on other faults could
profoundly affect the East Bay.

The night before a thought occurred to me--that this would be a good group
to float a proposal to.  As it turned out, only Ellen Corbett came and a
staffer for Assemblyman Dutra--so I did not get the attention of the full
committee.  The audience was primarily composed of Emergency Respnse
coordinators and Risk Managers for various East Bay school districts.

I wanted to let both of you know about the state "initiative" I proposed.
It may sound like something competing with our current eq monitoring
request, or it may be a clever way to sell monitoring $$ to the state
legislature.

I began by planting the idea that with dramatic increases in digital
technology and telecommunications over the past 10 years, not to mention
the Internet, we have an opportunity to raise a whole generation of
Californians who are aware of earthquakes and earthquake hazards by
harnessing the power of the web (SHakeMap, Community Internet Intensity
Map, etc).

I ended the talk with the following proposal with bulleted benefits (simply
one transparency):

CA Schools Seismic Station Initiative-
    a real-time, Internet-connected strong motion station in every school

* Educate kids and parents about eq hazards--
I explained that the kids could take "ownership" of their station, they
could use the internet to view the data recorded by their station, learn
how their station contributes to making a "ShakeMap" after any felt
earthquake, and learn that not all earthquakes are large and destructive,
some are small and not even felt).  This could create many "teachable
moments" in the schools and fundamentally integrate earth science as part
of the core science curriculum.

* Determine sensitivity of school site to shaking--
I briefly tried to explain how scientists could use numerous small
earthquakes as proxies for larger ones and learn about the sites
susceptibility to shaking.  This could help promote the role of geology in
determining shaking levels and lead to discussions about how different
rocks form.

* Provide real-time notification of potential damage for parents--
I suggested that based on the recorded level of shaking at the school, an
asssesment of likely damage could be made immediately and posted on the
web, this way parents could logon to their schools' site and get the
information.  With structural engineers we could establish a red, yellow,
green system for each school.  Another value of such monitoring is that in
many communities schools are designated as emergency sites and temporary
shelters

*****************NOTE:
I didn't mention with this group that this would be a way to greatly
densify our coverage in urban areas and would go a long way toward getting
a station in every zip code--that would not have sold to this audience.

It occurs to me that maybe this may be a way to sell the state on eq
monitoring.  A station in every school would certainly address OES' needs,
it would make it clear what the state was buying and getting, and all the
collateral education benefits could be really played up.  For example,
maybe the Cal State system schools could adopt nearby schools and have
students visit the schools to educate teachers and students about their
seismograph station and eqs in general.

Another potential twist would be to get the local communities involved in
cost-share, corporations could sponsor schools' stations, Kiwanis Club
could help raise funds, etc.

Seems like CDMG would be the ideal group to adminster such a program.

What do you think?

cheers,
Mary Lou





___________________________________________________________________________
Dr. Mary Lou Zoback, Chief Scientist    OFFICE: 650-329-4760
Western Region Earthquake Hazards Team	FAX:    650-329-5163
U.S. Geological Survey 			CELL:   650-868-2332

345 Middlefield Rd. MS 977              e-mail:  zoback@...................
Menlo Park, CA 94025

EHZ Team Secretary: Christine Jorgensen  OFFICE:  650-329-5626

-------------------------------------------------------------
Earthquake & related info on the web:  http://quake.usgs.gov
-------------------------------------------------------------
for access to the World Stress Map database published in 1992, see
README.worldstress in:

 ftp://andreas.wr.usgs.gov/pub/outgoing/zoback
____________________________________________________________________________