View Metadata
United States Historic Earthquakes, 2008
- Identification Information
- Data Quality Information
- Spatial Data Organization Information
- Spatial Reference Information
- Entity and Attribute Information
- Distribution Information
- Metadata Reference Information
- Identification Information
- Citation
- Originator
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- Originator
- ESRI
- Publication Date
- 2008
- Title
- United States Historic Earthquakes, 2008
- Edition
- 2008
- Geospatial Data Presentation Form
- vector digital data
- Series Information
- Series Name
- ESRI Data Maps
- Issue Identification
- 2008 World, Europe, United States, Canada, and Mexico
- Publication Information
- Publication Place
- Redlands, California, USA
- Publisher
- ESRI
- Online Linkage
- https://www1.columbia.edu/sec/acis/eds/dgate/studies/C1301/data/esri_2008_usa_quakehis.zip
- Abstract
- United States Historic Earthquakes is a point theme representing the locations of significant, historic earthquakes in United States and adjacent Canada and Mexico that caused deaths, property damage, and geological effects, or were otherwise experienced by the resident populations. Attribute information includes the depth, maximum magnitude, Modified Mercalli Intensity, location, date and time of the earthquakes. This dataset is a part of the 2008 ESRI Data Maps collection.
- Purpose
- United States Historic Earthquakes provides the locations of significant, historic earthquakes for geographic display and analysis at regional and national levels. This data set is intended for a mixed audience of specialists and non-specialists alike who have a need for general, non-technical information about significant U.S. earthquakes.
- Supplemental Information
- Largest scale when displaying the data: 1:1,000,000.
- Temporal Extent
- Currentness Reference
- ground condition
- Time Period
- Beginning
- 1568
- End
- 20040127
- Bounding Box
- West
- -179.992676
- East
- 180.000000
- North
- 68.688660
- South
- 17.250000
- Theme Keyword
- point
- earthquakes
- historic earthquakes
- depths
- magnitudes
- geological effects
- Theme Keyword Thesaurus
- None
- Theme Keyword
- geoscientificInformation
- Theme Keyword Thesaurus
- ISO 19115 Topic Categories
- Place Keyword
- United States
- Place Keyword Thesaurus
- Library of Congress Subject Headings
- Temporal Keyword
- 15682004
- Temporal Keyword Thesaurus
- None
- Access Restrictions
- For current Columbia affiliates only.
- Use Restrictions
- For educational, non-commercial use only.
- Status
- Complete
- Maintenance and Update Frequency
- Annually
- Point of Contact
- Contact Organization
- ESRI
- Delivery Point
- 380 New York Street
- City
- Redlands
- State
- California
- Postal Code
- 92373-8100
- Country
- USA
- Contact Telephone
- 909-793-2853
- Contact Facsimile Telephone
- 909-793-5953
- Contact Electronic Mail Address
- info@esri.com
- Hours of Service
- 7:00 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Pacific time, Monday-Friday
- Native Data Set Environment
- Microsoft Windows XP Version 5.1 (Build 2600) Service Pack 1; ESRI ArcCatalog 9.1.0.722
- Data Quality Information
- Attribute Accuracy Report
- The attribute table was scanned for unreasonable attribute values of depth and magnitude.
- Logical Consistency Report
- No formal tests for logical consistency were performed on this data set, principally because the data set contains attribute values that were arrived at by either or both quantitative (i.e. instrumental) and qualitative (i.e. historical) methods. Earthquakes that occurred prior to the introduction of seismological instrumentation are known only from written records, such as newspapers, books and journals, and diaries, which often may provide contradictory information that has to be carefully examined and weighed. As seismographs became more common in the early 1960's, the origin time and location were both more precisely and accurately determined but the compilation and evaluation of intensity reports was, and still is, a process that involves considerable subjectivity. As a result, all attributes associated with a given earthquake should be considered provisional and subject to further revision based on acquisition of new information and use of new analytical methods. The shapefile is converted to SDC (Smart Data Compression) format using either ESRI SDC Data Development Kit Professional 2 (DDKP2) or tools in ArcGIS. The SDC data set is then loaded into ArcSDE to verify and validate the geometry.
- Completeness Report
- This data set contains information on significant, historical earthquakes that caused deaths, property damage, geological effects, or that were experienced by populations in the epicentral area, for the United States, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and adjacent Canada and Mexico. These data are limited to the best estimates of earthquake locations and to attributes such as magnitude and maximum intensity. After processing, the data set is checked for drawing display and number of records and file sizes compared with source materials.
- Horizontal Positional Accuracy Report
- 100 meters is the nominal precision of the reported instrumentally located coordinate values but accuracy is considerably less. Accuracy depends upon numerous factors including imprecision of the velocity model of the earth, uneven distribution of seismic stations, and imprecisions in the computational algorithm. Following initial proofreading of the input data file, a preliminary map of the locations of the earthquakes was produced which was examined for gross errors in spatial location.
- Lineage
- Source
- Originator
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- Publication Date
- 200501
- Title
- Significant United States Earthquakes, 1568-2004
- Geospatial Data Presentation Form
- vector digital data
- Publication Information
- Publication Place
- Reston, Virginia, USA
- Publisher
- United States Geological Survey
- Other Citation Details
- Downloaded the data set in November 2005.
- Online Linkage
- http://nationalatlas.gov/atlasftp.html
- Source Scale Denominator
- 2000000
- Type of Source Media
- online
- Source Temporal Extent
- Time Period Information
- Range of Dates/Times
- Beginning Date
- 1568
- Ending Date
- 20040127
- Source Currentness Reference
- ground condition
- Contribution
- Attribute and geospatial data
- Spatial Data Organization Information
- Direct Spatial Reference Method
- Vector
- Point and Vector Object Information
- SDTS Terms Description
- SDTS Point and Vector Object Type
- Entity point
- Point and Vector Object Count
- 5345
- Spatial Reference Information
- Horizontal Coordinate System Definition
- Geographic
- Latitude Resolution
- 0.000001
- Longitude Resolution
- 0.000001
- Geographic Coordinate Units
- Decimal degrees
- Geodetic Model
- Horizontal Datum Name
- D_WGS_1984
- Ellipsoid Name
- WGS_1984
- Semi-major Axis
- 6378137.000000
- Denominator of Flattening Ratio
- 298.257224
- Vertical Coordinate System Definition
- Entity and Attribute Information
- Entity Type
- Entity Type Label
- quakehis
- Entity Type Definition
- The points represent earthquakes within or near to the United States that caused deaths, property damage, or geological effects, or that were experienced by populations in the epicentral area.
- Entity Type Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- Attributes
- ObjectID
- Internal feature number. (Sequential unique whole numbers that are automatically generated.)
- Definition Source
- ESRI
- Shape
- Feature geometry. (Coordinates defining the features.)
- Definition Source
- ESRI
- DEPTH
- The depth of focus of the earthquake in kilometers. A value of 0 may indicate the depth is unknown. (Numbers for the features.)
- -9999
- Unknown.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- MAG
- The maximum magnitude of the earthquake. The maximum magnitude is the greatest of the body wave magnitude, duration, moment magnitude, surface wave magnitude, or local magnitude defined for the region. (Numbers for the features.)
- -9999
- Unknown.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- MMI
- The Modified Mercalli Intensity of the earthquake, where the integer value represents the Roman numeral designation of the MMI intensity.
- F
- The earthquake was felt but no Modified Mercalli Intensity was assigned.
- 2
- Felt only by a few persons at rest, especially on upper floors of buildings. Delicately suspended objects may swing.
- 3
- Felt quite noticeably by persons indoors, especially on upper floors of buildings. Many people do not recognize it as an earthquake. Standing motorcars may rock slightly. Vibration similar to the passing of truck. Duration estimated.
- 4
- Felt indoors by many, outdoors by few during the day. At night, some awakened. Dishes, windows, doors disturbed; walls make cracking sound. Sensation like heavy truck striking building. Standing motorcars rocked noticeably.
- 5
- Felt by nearly everyone; many awakened. Some dishes, windows broken. Unstable objects overturned. Pendulum clocks may stop.
- 6
- Felt by all; many frightened. Some heavy furniture moved; a few instances of fallen plaster. Damage slight.
- 7
- Damage negligible in building of good design and construction; slight to moderate in well-built ordinary structures; considerable damage in poorly built or badly designed structures; some chimneys broken. Noticed by persons driving motorcars.
- 8
- Damage slight in specially designed structures; considerable in ordinary substantial buildings with partial collapse. Damage great in poorly built structures. Fall of chimneys, factory stacks, columns, monuments, and walls. Heavy furniture overturned.
- 9
- Damage considerable in specially designed structures; well-designed frame structures thrown out of plumb. Damage great in substantial buildings, with partial collapse. Buildings shifted off foundations.
- 10
- Some well-built wooden structures destroyed; most masonry and frame structures destroyed with foundations. Railroad rails bent.
- 11
- Few, if any (masonry) structures remain standing. Bridges destroyed. Railroad rails bent greatly.
- 12
- Damage total. Lines of sight and level distorted. Objects thrown into the air.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- LOCATION
- The name of the town, city, physical feature, or other describable location nearest to the occurrence. (Descriptions for the features.)
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- YEAR
- The year of the occurrence. (1568 to 2004)
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- MONTH
- The month of the occurrence. (1 to 12)
- -9999
- Unknown.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- DAY
- The day of the month of the occurrence. (1 to 31)
- -9999
- Unknown.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- HOUR
- The hour of day of the occurrence on a 24-hour clock in Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). (0 to 23)
- -9999
- Unknown.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- MINUTE
- The minute of the hour of the occurrence. (0 to 59)
- -9999
- Unknown.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- SECOND
- The second of the minute of the occurrence. (0.00 to 59.99)
- -9999
- Unknown.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- Distribution Information
- Format Name
- SDC
- Distributor
- ESRI; ESRI International Distributors
- Name
- Metadata Reference Information
- Metadata Date
- 20090715
- Metadata Contact
- Contact Information
- Contact Organization Primary
- Contact Organization
- Research Data Services (RDS), Columbia University Libraries
- Contact Person
- GIS/Metadata Librarian
- Contact Address
- Address
- 420 W. 118th St. 215 IAB, MC 3301
- City
- New York
- State or Province
- NY
- Postal Code
- 10027
- Country
- USA
- Contact Voice Telephone
- (212) 854-6012
- Contact Electronic Mail Address
- data@library.columbia.edu
- Metadata Standard Name
- FGDC Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata
- Metadata Standard Version
- FGDC-STD-001-1998
