EARTHQUAKE INFORMATION SYSTEM: A CROWDSOURCING MOBILE APPLICATION

TO INFORM AND GATHER DATA

Recep Cenk Tarhan

(Thesis Supervisor: Karin Şeşetyan &Thesis Co-Supervisor: Mustafa Erdik)

ABSTRACT

It has been observed that large earthquakes, which have taken place in Turkey and around the world during the last 10 years, could cause great social and economic losses in centers that are densely populated. It is crucial that regions, which had been affected by the earthquake, should be identified fast and in the correct way in order that search, and rescue activities could be carried out effectively.

Evaluation of place and level of damage promptly following a destructive earthquake through the data received from emergency intervention systems could facilitate the earthquake emergency response process. In this respect, numerous institutes around the world have introduced on-line earthquake intensity surveys in order to establish internet based macro-seismic maps and hence to determine the regions that are affected by the earthquake the most. The purpose of the surveys is to establish earthquake intensity map immediately after the earthquake by collecting macro-seismic intensity data from the people who feel the earthquake.

This project aims to collect this information from the individuals, spread around Turkey, using a mobile application which works both ways: One part of the application gives information about the recent earthquakes, seismicity history of the current location of the user, individual’s distance to epicenter etc. The other part of the application lets the user to provide KOERI how he/she felt the earthquake by answering some multiple-choice questions. While answering these questions, the application also records the geographic location of the user. This information is then stored in the central database and can be used for further analysis of the impact of the earthquake and for fine-tuning the instrumental intensity maps.