Citizen Seismology in the Arctic

Zeinab Jeddi,Finn Danielsen,Pâviârak Jakobsen,Tine B Larsen,Gerth Nielsen,Peter H Voss,Trine Dahl-Jensen,Per Ole Frederiksen,Adam Hansen,Mathilde B Sørensen

doi:10.3389/feart.2020.00139

Abstract

Landslides, earthquakes and other natural disasters are expected to increase in the Arctic, yet our ability to make informed decisions about safety is tightly limited by lack of data. As part of the Integrated Arctic Observation System (INTAROS) project, geophones were installed by residents in Greenland and by University of Bergen in Svalbard in 2018. The purpose of the installations was to explore challenges and benefits of community-based data collection for seismological monitoring in the Arctic region. Raspberry Shake units with one/three-component velocity sensors were selected for the deployment, due to their user-friendly configuration, easy installation, and well established digital platform and web services. The purpose of engaging community members in the use of geophone sensors was to monitor earthquakes, cryoseisms (events generated by ice mass), and landslides. We report our findings with respect to challenges regarding the installation and operation of the Raspberry Shake sensors at both locations. Connecting community-based recordings with permanent seismological networks improved both the detection capability and the data support for understanding seismic events in Greenland. In contrast, finding suitable locations for deployments in Longyearbyen turned out to be challenging, because most buildings are constructed on poles due to the permafrost and indoor space is expensive. Promoting citizen seismology in the Arctic could improve monitoring of seismic events in the Arctic while simultaneously raising community awareness of natural hazards.

Highlights

Natural disasters, e.g., landslides or earthquakes among others, are likely to increase with the changes in the climatic conditions in the Arctic (e.g., Dahl-Jensen et al, 2004; Hestnes et al, 2016; Clinton et al, 2017)
The European Union funded project, Integrated Arctic Observation System (INTAROS)1, aims to contribute to innovative solutions to fill some of the critical gaps
Monitoring of seismic activity in western Greenland has been ongoing for more than 100 years (Gregersen, 1982), not due to local earthquakes, but because of Greenland’s unique location for observing earthquakes on a global scale due to low level of man-made noise. This is to our knowledge the first time in Greenland that geophones have been established in communities and setup by local residents

Summary

INTRODUCTION

E.g., landslides or earthquakes among others, are likely to increase with the changes in the climatic conditions in the Arctic (e.g., Dahl-Jensen et al, 2004; Hestnes et al, 2016; Clinton et al, 2017). In the first example (Figure 3B), the seismic recording is classified as a tectonic event and the two CS units are nearest to the epicenter In this case, the two Raspberry Shakes have higher signal-to-noise ratios than the permanent station for the P-wave phases and they improve the event location. Only two places could fulfill our basic technical requirements (power and a cabled internet connection), provide appropriate locations for the sensors (on the ground floor of the building) and were willing to host the instruments: Svalbard museum and Radisson Blu Polar hotel. The performance of the data was assessed for the Longyearbyen installations (Figures 4A,B) by noise analyses through calculations of power spectral densities In this case the high frequencies are suffering from very high levels of noise, exceeding the New High Noise Model of Peterson (1993) in LYB2 (Radisson Blu Polar Hotel).

DISCUSSION AND LEARNED

Findings

DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT