Skip to content

Changes

Page history
Incorporate edits from Kwong, Neal (Simon) authored by Lin, Kuo-wan's avatar Lin, Kuo-wan
Show whitespace changes
Inline Side-by-side
Home.md
View page @ af09e530
---
title: ShakeCast
keywords: ShakeCast introduction
summary: ShakeCast overview will help you get started quickly with the documentation. The other topics in this help provide additional information and detail about working with other aspects of ShakeCast.
summary: ShakeCast summary will help you quickly understand the system and its potential uses for your needs. For context, a brief history is provided at the end.
---
[[_TOC_]]
## System Overview
## Summary
[ShakeCast](https://code.usgs.gov/ghsc/esi/shakecast/shakecast)®, short for ShakeMap Broadcast, is a freely available, post-earthquake situational awareness application, for delivering ShakeMap and other earthquake products from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to critical users and for triggering established post-earthquake response protocols. ShakeCast automatically retrieves earthquake shaking data from ShakeMap, allows utilities, transportation agencies, and other large organizations to automatically determine the shaking value at their facilities, set thresholds for notification of inspection priority for each facility and then automatically sends notifications of potential impacts, and generates maps and other web-based products for emergency managers and responders.
[ShakeCast](https://code.usgs.gov/ghsc/esi/shakecast/shakecast)®, short for ShakeMap Broadcast, is a freely available, post-earthquake situational awareness software application. The application aims to help users (e.g., transportation agencies, utility managers, businesses) automatically retrieve earthquake shaking data at their facilities from U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) earthquake products such as the [ShakeMap](https://earthquake.usgs.gov/data/shakemap/). Users can set thresholds for triggering established post-earthquake response protocols at their facilities. In the event of an earthquake, ShakeCast automatically sends notifications to emergency managers and responders about potential impacts, inspection priorities, and other web-based products.
In general, businesses, utilities, and agencies could develop their own strategies and tools for the utilization of ShakeMap given their unique facilities and communication paths. However, such efforts can be costly and complex. The USGS facilitated this process with the development of ShakeCast, by building a more general use tool that accomplishes most of the critical user needs. These features are particularly useful when an organization has a significant portfolio of facilities in an affected region and must prioritize with limited resources. However, additional needs are common in that a user is typically interested in obtaining detailed site-specific information. Much of these includes the licensing basis, response protocol, loss estimate, and ground failure potential, to name a few.
In general, users could develop their own strategies and tools for utilizing ShakeMap given their unique facilities and communication paths. However, such efforts can be costly and complex. The USGS facilitated this process with the development of ShakeCast, which accomplishes most of the users' critical needs. ShakeCast is particularly useful when an organization manages a significant portfolio of facilities that may be affected by earthquakes and must prioritize with limited resources. Additional user needs include obtaining detailed site-specific information such as licensing basis, response protocol, loss estimate, or ground failure potential.
## Software History
**Suggested citation**: Lin, Kw., Wald, D.J., Slosky, D. (2020). Earthquakes, ShakeCast. In: Gupta, H. (eds) Encyclopedia of Solid Earth Geophysics. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Cham. DOI: [10.1007/978-3-030-10475-7_255-1](https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10475-7_255-1).
The current [ShakeCast version 4, released in 2019](https://code.usgs.gov/ghsc/esi/shakecast/shakecast/-/releases), is a complete re-design of the application aimed at alleviating the pain points of its consumer base, while improving functionality. The official release of ShakeCast V4 and on—as well as newer versions of USGS’s ShakeMap, “Did You Feel It?”, and PAGER systems—have been developed in Python due to its functionality and near-ubiquity in computer science courses and academia. Our aim is to be more intuitive and include new features that both general users and administrators will find helpful, based on best practices in software development as well as direct feedback from many ShakeCast users. Many of the modifications are based on direct user feedback, feature requests, and culling of vestigial functions. Developing and incorporating advanced fragility assignments into the ShakeCast Workbook requires related software modifications and database improvements; these enhancements are part of an extensive rewrite of the ShakeCast application (Wald et al., 2017).
![ShakeCast_Timeline_Diagram.drawio](uploads/8bcd966409fb8c1b2bc58659af7bd110/ShakeCast_Timeline_Diagram.drawio.png)
## Who should use ShakeCast
## Licensing
Businesses, utility managers, emergency responders, and others who have an urgent need for information about the post-earthquake impact on their own facilities so that they can make informed decisions and act quickly to ensure safety, restore system functionality, and minimize losses.
ShakeCast source code is free software. Unless otherwise noted, this project is in the public domain in the United
States because it contains materials that originally came from the United
States Geological Survey, an agency of the United States Department of
Interior. For more information, see the official USGS copyright policy at
https://www.usgs.gov/information-policies-and-instructions/copyrights-and-credits
Additionally, we waive copyright and related rights in the work
worldwide through the CC0 1.0 Universal public domain dedication.
## Who should probably not use ShakeCast
## Service Model
Individual users without a significant number of facilities and knowledge of their inventory. ShakeCast requires significant commitment of time, involving expertise in both earthquake engineering and information technology.
As a distributed software application, ShakeCast can now be installed either “in-house” within a user’s network and their physical or virtual operating systems (Figure 1), or more commonly by running an “instance” of the ShakeCast software as a cloud-hosted service after cloning the system disc image provided by USGS.
![ShakeCast_Topology](uploads/456faa27985264ffe17e76f231090c9c/ShakeCast_Topology.png).
## Service model
## Who should use ShakeCast
As a distributed software application, ShakeCast can be used in two ways: (1) by running an [instance](https://aws.amazon.com/what-is/cloud-instances/) of it in a cloud-hosted service, or (2) by installing it on-premise within a user’s network and operating systems.
Businesses, utility and other lifeline managers, emergency responders, and others have an urgent need for information about the impact on their own facilities so they can make informed decisions and take quick actions to ensure safety, restore system functionality, and minimize losses.
![ShakeCast_Topology](uploads/ShakeCast_Topology.png).
## Who should probably not use ShakeCast
Individual users without a significant number of facilities and knowledge of their inventory. ShakeCast requires significant commitment of time and both IT and earthquake engineering expertise.
## User story: State Departments of Transportation (DOTs)
Caltrans has been collaborating with the USGS since 2005 to develop and continuously improve a robust and operational platform. ShakeCast is particularly suitable for earthquake planning and response purposes by Caltrans and other State DOTs, since they can utilize existing [NBI databases](https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/bridge/nbi.cfm), which they are required to keep up-to-date, to assess potential impacts and implement shaking-based inspection priorities. Since 2017, USGS has partnered with Caltrans and nine other State DOTs under a Transportation Pooled Fund (TPF) to fully implement ShakeCast for these departments, adding customized configurations for each department and functions that are pertinent across all departments. An additional goal of this TPF solicitation was to "connect the DOTs" by bringing ShakeCast to all states with seismic hazards, which is important as impacts from major earthquakes could cross state borders (Turner et al., 2018).
## User Case: State Departments of Transportation (DOTs)
![Transportation_Pooled_Fund_Phase_II](uploads/Transportation_Pooled_Fund_Phase_II.png)
Caltrans has been collaborating with the USGS since 2005 to develop and continuously improve a robust and operational ShakeCast platform. ShakeCast is particularly suitable for earthquake planning and response purposes by Caltrans and other State DOTs, in part because they can utilize existing NBI databases—which they are required to keep up-to-date—to implement shaking-based inspection priority and impact assessments. Since 2017, USGS has partnered with Caltrans and nine other State DOTs under a Transportation Pooled Fund (TPF) to fully implement ShakeCast for these departments, and to add customized configurations to each and functions pertinent across all. An additional goal of this TPF solicitation was to "connect the DOTs" to bring this technology to all states with seismic hazards, as the major earthquakes anticipated to occur in the future will cross state borders (Figure 2) (Turner et al., 2018).
## Software gistory
![Transportation_Pooled_Fund_Phase_II](uploads/6e89ace041378bd4d9cb78fcbf38822e/Transportation_Pooled_Fund_Phase_II.png)
\ No newline at end of file
The current version of ShakeCast, [V4 released in 2019](https://code.usgs.gov/ghsc/esi/shakecast/shakecast/-/releases), is a complete re-design of the application aimed at alleviating the pain points of its consumer base, while improving functionality. Newer versions of ShakeCast, ShakeMap, “Did You Feel It?”, and PAGER systems have been developed in Python due to its functionality and near-ubiquity in computer science courses and in academia. ShakeCast aims to be more intuitive and include features that both general users and administrators will find helpful. Many of the modifications are based on direct feedback from many ShakeCast users, feature requests, best practices in software development, and culling of vestigial functions. For example, developing and incorporating advanced fragility assignments into the ShakeCast Workbook required extensive software modifications and database improvements (Wald et al., 2017).
![ShakeCast_Timeline_Diagram.drawio](uploads/ShakeCast_Timeline_Diagram.drawio.png)
## Licensing
ShakeCast source code is free software. Unless otherwise noted, this project is in the public domain in the United
States because it contains materials that originally came from the United
States Geological Survey, an agency of the United States Department of
Interior. For more information, see the official USGS copyright policy at
https://www.usgs.gov/information-policies-and-instructions/copyrights-and-credits
Additionally, we waive copyright and related rights in the work
worldwide through the CC0 1.0 Universal public domain dedication.
\ No newline at end of file