Sara K McBride, PhD, MPA (Former Employee)

Although small earthquakes are expected to produce weak shaking, ground motion is highly variable and there are outlier earthquakes that generate more shaking than expected—sometimes significantly more. We explore datasets of M 0.5–8.3 earthquakes to determine the relative impact of frequent, smaller-magnitude earthquakes that rarely produce strong ground motion, to rare, large...

Previous research has shown that online social networks can provide valuable insights regarding collective human responses to extreme natural events, such as earthquakes. Most previous studies focused on one large earthquake, while the 2019 Ridgecrest earthquakes involved two significant earthquakes occurring within a short period of time (a M6.4 foreshock on July 4 and a M7.1 mainshock...

The 2020 Mw 5.8 Lone Pine earthquake, the largest earthquake on the Owens Valley fault zone, eastern California, since the nineteenth century, ruptured an extensional stepover in that fault. Owens Valley separates two normal‐faulting regimes, the western margin of the Great basin and the eastern margin of the Sierra Nevada, forming a complex seismotectonic zone, and a possible nascent...

Earthquake early warning (EEW) can be used to detect earthquakes and provide advanced notification of strong shaking, allowing pre-emptive actions to be taken that not only benefit infrastructure but reduce injuries and fatalities. Currently Aotearoa New Zealand does not have a nationwide EEW system, so a survey of the public was undertaken to understand whether EEW was considered useful...

Operational earthquake forecasts (OEFs) are represented as time‐dependent probabilities of future earthquake hazard and risk. These probabilities can be presented in a variety of formats, including tables, maps, and text‐based scenarios. In countries such as Aotearoa New Zealand, the U.S., and Japan, OEFs have been released by scientific organizations to agencies and the public, with the...

As ShakeAlert, the earthquake early warning system for the West Coast of the U.S., begins its transition to operational public alerting, we explore how post-alert messaging might represent system performance. Planned post-alert messaging can provide timely, crucial information to both emergency managers and ShakeAlert operators as well as calibrate expectations among various publics or...

The 2018 Kīlauea Volcano eruption lasted 107 days, and now ranks as the most destructive event at Kilauea since 1790, and as one of the most costly volcanic disasters in U.S. history. Multiple simultaneous hazard events unfolded, including sustained seismic activity leading to collapse at the summit of Halema'uma'u crater and severe damage to the HVO facility, with additional eruption of...

Debris flows generate seismic signals that contain valuable information about events as they unfold. Though seismic waves have been used for along-channel debris-flow and lahar monitoring systems for decades, it has proven difficult to move beyond detection to more quantitative characterizations of flow parameters and event size. This is for two primary reasons: (1) our limited...

In the minutes to hours after a major earthquake, such as the recent 2018 Mw 7.1 Anchorage event, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) produces a suite of interconnected earthquake products that provides diverse information ranging from basic earthquake source parameters to loss estimates. The 2018 Anchorage earthquake is the first major domestic earthquake to occur since several new USGS...

Communicating probabilities of natural hazards to varied audiences is a notoriously difficult task. Many of these challenges were encountered during the 2016 Bombay Beach, California, swarm of ~100 2≤M≤4.3 earthquakes, which began on 26 September 2016 and lasted for several days. The swarm’s proximity to the southern end of the San Andreas fault caused concern that a larger earthquake...

To reduce future earthquake injuries and casualties, it is important that people understand how their behavior, during and immediately following earthquake shaking, exposes them to increased risk of injury or death. Research confirms that protective actions can reduce injuries and that prior training can help prepare people to take appropriate actions. In this paper, we examine barriers...

The Canterbury Earthquake Sequence (CES) began with the Darfield earthquake on 4 September 2010. Continual large and small aftershocks since that time have meant communities have cycled through repeated periods of impact, response and recovery. Scientific communication about aftershocks during such a prolonged sequence has faced distinct challenges. We conducted research to better...