View Metadata
United States Historic Earthquakes, 2012
- 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
- Environmental Systems Research Institute (Redlands, Calif.)
- Publication Date
- 2012
- Title
- United States Historic Earthquakes, 2012
- Edition
- 2012
- Geospatial Data Presentation Form
- vector digital data
- Series Information
- Series Name
- Data Maps for ArcGIS
- Issue Identification
- 2012 - World, Europe, and United States
- Publication Information
- Publication Place
- Redlands, California, USA
- Publisher
- Esri
- Online Linkage
- https://www1.columbia.edu/sec/acis/eds/dgate/studies/C1301/data/esri_2012_us_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.
- Purpose
- U.S. National Atlas 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
- 20090818
- Bounding Box
- West
- -179.992676
- East
- 180.000000
- North
- 68.688660
- South
- 17.250000
- Theme Keyword
- point
- earthquakes
- historic earthquakes
- depths
- magnitudes
- geological effects
- geoscientificInformation
- Theme Keyword Thesaurus
- None
- Theme Keyword
- geoscientificInformation
- Theme Keyword Thesaurus
- ISO 19115 Topic Categories
- Place Keyword
- United States
- Puerto Rico
- Canada
- Mexico
- Place Keyword Thesaurus
- Library of Congress Subject Headings
- Temporal Keyword
- 1568-2009
- 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 Vista Version 6.1 (Build 7600) ; ESRI ArcCatalog 9.3.1.4000
- 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 tools in ArcGIS. The SDC data set is then imported into a file geodatabase to verify, validate, and if needed repair 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 imprecision 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
- 201007
- Title
- Significant United States Earthquakes, 1568-2009
- Geospatial Data Presentation Form
- vector digital data
- Publication Information
- Publication Place
- Reston, Virginia, USA
- Publisher
- National Atlas of the United States
- Other Citation Details
- Downloaded the data set in January 2012.
- 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
- 20090818
- 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
- 5396
- Spatial Reference Information
- Horizontal Coordinate System Definition
- Geographic
- Latitude Resolution
- 0.000000
- Longitude Resolution
- 0.000000
- 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 magnitude of the earthquake. The magnitude can be one of an estimated body wave magnitude (commonly computed from the felt area for earthquakes that occurred before seismic instruments were in general use), duration or coda length of the earthquake vibration, local magnitude (also known as the original "Richter" magnitude), moment magnitude (the measure of total energy released by an earthquake), local or regional magnitude (the body wave magnitude using the Lg wave), surface wave magnitude (a seismic wave that travels along the earth's surface), or body wave magnitude (a seismic wave that travels through the earth's inner layers). (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 (MMI) of the earthquake, where the integer value represents the Roman numeral designation of the MMI intensity.
- F
- The earthquake was felt but no MMI 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 a truck. Duration estimated in some cases.
- 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 earthquake event. (Descriptions for the features.)
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- YEAR
- The year the earthquake occurred. (1568 to 2009)
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- MONTH
- The month the earthquake occurred. (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 when the earthquake occurred. (1 to 31)
- -9999
- Unknown.
- Definition Source
- National Atlas of the United States and the United States Geological Survey
- HOUR
- The hour of day when the earthquake occurred 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 when the earthquake occurred. (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 when the earthquake occurred. (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 Offices
- Online Access
- http://www.ArcGIS.com
- Name
- Metadata Reference Information
- Metadata Date
- 20130205
- 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
- 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
