About the catalogue search

Use this search to produce a list of events showing the prime (ISC-EHB) hypocentre for each event and any selected magnitude values. The output will always output the magnitudes associated to the prime hypocentre but events may be searched by any magnitude author, which will also be output if selected.

Output format

• CSV formatted catalogue:

A fixed format, comma separated output, with one line per event. The number of fields will vary depending on the number of magnitudes that match the search criteria. For a full explanation of each field, see the csv catalogue output page.

• QuakeML:

The results are output as an XML stream using the QuakeML XML Schema, version 1.1. This output is not designed for use in a browser and will cause browsers to crash for large queries. For a complete explanation of the schema, please view the documentation on the QuakeML site.

Search region

There are four possible methods for defining a search region (rectangular, circular, global, Flinn-Engdahl region). Leaving fields blank, will automatically default to a global search. To interactively define a search region, using customised shapes, please use the interactive search page. The defined region is used to check only the prime hypocentre - secondary hypocentres within a search region will not influence the results.

Time period

This is the start and end date to search for events. Only the prime hypocentre will be searched to match events - i.e. origin times for secondary hypocentres will not influence the results.

Unknown depths

As some events have no determined depth, you may optionally choose to include events with unknown depths in the search. This will return events which match any selected depth constraint you enter as well as events with no depth.

Unknown magnitudes

As some events have no determined magnitude, you may optionally choose to include events with unknown magnitude values in the search. This will return events which match any selected magnitude constraint you enter as well as events with no magnitude value.

Magnitude type

Limit events by magnitude for specific magnitude types. Due to the large number of magnitude types and the various notation used, the selected type will search all magnitudes of that type. E.g. MB will match all body-wave magnitudes: mb, mB, MB, mb1mx, etc.

Magnitude author

Limit events by magnitude values determined by a specific author. ISC, NEIC, GCMT/HRVD, JMA, amongst others are considered reliable magnitude authors. The default uses the prime author - these are magnitudes directly associated with the prime hypocentre.

E.g. To search for events with MW >= 6, you may want to specify the magnitude author to be GCMT.

Please note: selecting either GCMT or HRVD, will return results from both agencies, as GCMT is a continuation of HRVD.

Output links

This provides links for each event to the full Bulletin listing. There are also links for each author to provide the full agency details.