Texas Educational Seismic Project

)Do you track current events?  Did You Know that is the past 7 days, our Earth has experienced more than 54 moderate-to-strong earthquakes with magnitudes M>4.5 just around the Pacific Rim “Ring of Fire” ??! Three of these events (shown highlighted in teal-colored circles) had strong magnitudes: a M6.6 in Vanuatu (01/15/2019), a M6.7 in Chile (01/20/2019), and a M6.4 occurred today, (01/22/2019), in Indonesia.

Add less than two minutes into your routine….and watch the Earth MOVE, LIVE!  view USGS’ Global Maps HERE

** please note this post was published prior to the 01/22/2019 19:01hrs UTC Prince Edward Island earthquake with a magnitude of M6.7

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We use seismometers to monitor many other forms of ground movement, including the *changing* weather.  Overnight, and this morning, a strong cold air front is moving across Houston, TX.  This cold front is rapidly dropping temperatures, air pressure and wind speeds.  Currently, winds are > 20 mph with strong gusts moving faster than 30 mph over SW Texas!

Can you identify when the cold front artived by interpreting this seismogram?

Your generous financial support facilitates our #scienceeducational programs and ongoing solid earth geophysics >>> CLICK HERE!

A small-moderate magnitude M4.0 earthquake happened on Wednesday, January 16, 2019 at 03:34hrs UTC (09:34 pm CST) near Caldwell, Kansas. See images, below.

Your generous financial support facilitates our #scienceeducational programs and ongoing solid earth geophysics >>> CLICK HERE!

A very strong magnitude M6.0 earthquake happened during the Houston-time lunch period.  This earthquake is capable of producing a tsunami, but no warning was issued by The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. >>> https://ptwc.weather.gov/

In fact, no tsunami warnings or earthquake events have been updated since Tuesday, Jan 15, 2018.  We are unsure if the US’s partial government shutdown is affecting staffing at NOAA, but there is an alert banner on their website citing some critical staff is working.  Its possible that an issued warning was not needed, and therefore the web page isn’t been maintained for non-threatening events.  BUT, it does highlight the scenario that many government and government-sponsored Scientists are struggling to keep public data available in real time.

The M6.0 earthquake was recorded #RasberryShake (#raspishake) Station RAD87 in Spring TX, operated by Texas Educational Seismic Project.  See images, below.

Your generous financial support facilitates our #scienceeducational programs and ongoing solid earth geophysics >>> CLICK HERE!

posting on behalf of the Texas Girls Collaborative …. see request for STEM volunteers…Texas Educational Seismic Project participated in this event historically (2016), and it was full of laughter, learning and contagious curiosity – come join!

“Happy New Year! 

I wanted to pass along information on the GEMS event at HMNS that is happening in February.

With the new year in full swing, we are getting ready for all of our 2019 events including GEMS. We are excited to invite you to participate as a Community Booth at Girls Exploring Math & Science (GEMS) on Saturday February 16^th from 9am to 1pm.  The GEMS event is designed to encourage student interest in STEM subjects. Community Booths are an important part of this event because it is a great opportunity for students to see what your organization does with science, technology, engineering or math and talk to your staff about their careers. Each Community Booth also has a STEM activity or demonstration to present to students and their families. These activities and demonstrations do not have to be complicated or expensive, so please feel free to reuse ideas that you have done at GEMS in the past or at other similar festivals. If you have any questions about the event, please feel free to ask anything and everything, and I will be happy to help!

We do have limited availability for community booths as this program has expanded quite a lot in the last few years. If you would like to secure your place as a Community Booth, please fill out the attached application and return to GEMS@hmns.org or via fax at 713-639-4681. There is additional information about requirements and frequently asked questions in the Community INFO packet attached to this email as well.

Kelsey Friedemann 
Assistant Director of Youth Education
Ph. 713.639.4766 | kfriedemann@hmns.org

theHoustonMuseumofnaturalscience

How many more strong earthquakes will we record today??  Assume that approximately 1000+ earthquakes with a magnitude M>5.0 occur per year.

The last 24 hours, from Saturday January 5 thru part of Sunday January 6, 2019, Station E1TX, operated by Texas Educational Seismic Project (TXESP), did **not** record teleseismic waves from several moderate global earthquakes.  For example, E1TX recorded the M6.1 Alaskan earthquake at 18:47hrs UTC on Saturday; however, two  moderate M5.0 earthquakes occurred near the original epicenter ~9 and 13 hrs later and were not recorded at our Station.  Why might that be?

Shown below is a 24-hour screen capture during 05/01/2019 to 06/01/2019.  It is marked with black arrows of all earthquakes, with magnitudes M > 5.0, which occurred.  Note that many were not recorded.  The “missing” earthquake seismograms are not actually “missing”, they bring us important observations regarding instrumental sensitivities, Earth’s heterogeneities, and re-affirm / challenge theories relative to wave theory.

SO, where have all the “cowboys”, er, earthquakes, gone?? 🙂