Preliminary calibration of candidate alpha stations in the GSETT-3 network

Abstract

The technical concept of a future global seismic monitoring system includes 50 to 60 core stations, mostly arrays, which provide the primary detection and location capability. Due to the average station distance, these core (“alpha”) stations form a teleseismic network. Many of the proposed stations are to be newly installed and before the network can be regarded as fully operational, the stations have to be calibrated. As for traditional seismic networks, the station residuals - compared to a standard earth model - have to be determined. The standard earth model is defined in terms of travel-time tables and amplitude-distance curves. After recording a representative set of events, station residuals with respect to travel-time and magnitude can be calculated. In case of arrays, the determination of mislocation vectors (azimuth and slowness residuaIs) are of ulmost importance if array slowness vectors are used as starting solutions in a location procedure. Finally, in a monitoring context it is very important to estimate the station sensitivity for varying background noise conditíons and - in case of arrays - to know the frequency dependent improvement by beamforming. This paper uses the newly installed high-frequency GERESS array in Germany to demonstrate the calibration procedure.