The Global Disaster Alert and Coordination System provides near real-time alerts about natural disasters around the world and tools to facilitate response coordination, including media monitoring, map catalogues and Virtual On-Site Operations Coordination Centre.

GDACS sources for event information

The list of events published by GDACS is compiled from information provided by GDACS partners or from public information syndicated on the Internet.

Automatic event collection by the Asgard system (JRC)

Earthquakes can be detected within minutes through a global network of seismic detectors. Many seismological institutes in the world maintain such sensors and share their information to allow for a rapid and automatic determination of earthquake characteristics by computation centres. In turn, these data are made public using telecommunication or the Internet.

The GDACS earthquake impact model is built on this seismological infrastructure. Without it, GDACS would not be able to obtain rapid estimations of location, magnitude and depth of earthquakes. In order to ensure robust information gathering, GDACS collects information from various sources.

GDACS collects information every 5 minutes from the following sources:

• United States Geological Survey National Earthquake Information Center (NEIC): http://neic.usgs.gov/.
  • http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsww/catalogs/eqs7day-M2.5.xml
• European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC): http://www.emsc-csem.org/.
  • Source page: http://www.emsc-csem.org/index.php?page=current&sub=list
  • http://www.gdacs.org/xml/emsc.xml
• GEOFON Programme of the GFZ Potsdam: http://www.gfz-potsdam.de/geofon/.
  • http://geofon.gfz-potsdam.de/db/eqinfo.php?fmt=rss
• Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA): http://www.jma.go.jp/
  • Source page: http://www.jma.go.jp/en/quake/quake_local_index.html
  • http://www.gdacs.org/xml/jma.xml

Tropical cyclones are monitored continuously by national and international meteorological organisations (see World Meteorological Organisation). Official data is released by Regional Specialized Meteorological Centers. However, for aggregated data on a global level other sources are available.

GDACS collects information every 10 minutes from the following sources:

• Pacific Disaster Center: http://www.pdc.org

• Hawaii University, IFA SOLAR: http://www.solar.ifa.hawaii.edu/Tropical/tropical.html.

Volcanoes are most often monitored by national institutions. The Smithsonian Institution's Global Volcanism Program is an authoritative source on volcano information, with weekly bulletins on volcanic eruptions. The International Volcano Research Centre keeps day-to-day information about eruptions from around the globe. GDACS collects this information every hour from:

• International Volcano Research Centre: http://www.intlvrc.org
  • http://www.intlvrc.org/alerts.xml
  • http://www.intlvrc.org/alerts.htm

The International Volcano Research Centre (INTLVRC) gets eruption information either directly from volcano observatories and/or from geophysical agencies about the world such as, the Cascade Volcano Observatory (CVO), the Montserrat Volcano Observatory (MVO), the Universidad de Colima, CENAPRED (The National Center of Disaster Prevention), the Instituto Nacional de Sismologia, Vulcanologia, Meterologia, e Hidrologia (INSIVUMEH), the Instituto Geofisico (IG), the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (HVO), the Rabaul Volcano Observatory (RVO), the Observatorio Vulcanológico y Sismológico de Costa Rica, Instituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia - Sezione di Catania, the Mt. Erebus Volcano Observatory (MEVO), the Wellington VAAC , the Buenos Aires VAAC, the Observatory Vulcanológico and Sismológico de Popayán (INGEOMINAS), the Philippine Volcano Observatory (PHIVOLCS), the Kamchatkan Volcanic Eruption Response Team (KVERT), the Darwin VAAC, and the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA), to name a few of the major and principal reporting agencies.  This information is checked on a daily basis or as sent to INTLVRC directly as a situation dictates.  This information is published directly onto the INTLVRC website within 24 hours after the information is validated by phone call, e-mail or confirmation from other reputable sites (e.g., The Smithsonian Institution).  The website (www.intlvrc.org) is updated manually on a daily basis.

Floods are monitored on a global basis by the Dartmouth Flood Observatory (DFO). GDACS/JRC has a partnership with DFO to provide updated lists of ongoing floods in the world. Furthermore, JRC is collaborating with DFO on a flood detection system using satellite imagery.

• Dartmouth Flood Observatory: http://www.dartmouth.edu/~floods
  • converted to RSS
  • http://www.dartmouth.edu/~floods/Archives/2007sum.htm

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