Lead Time for Cities of Northern India by Using Multiparameter EEW Algorithm

Earthquake early warning (EEW) is considered one of the important real-time earthquake damage mitigation measures. The presence of seismogenic sources generating high seismicity in Himalayas and the cities of concern lying at appropriate distances makes Northern India a perfect case to be monitored using EEW systems. In the present study, an attempt has been made to estimate the lead times for Northern Indian cities for issuing early warning by using the EEW system deployed by IIT Roorkee in Central Himalayas. The instrumentation deployed at 100 locations between Uttarkashi and Chamoli has been used to estimate the lead time at six cities. The estimated lead time includes the time to reach S-wave after subtraction of the sum of P-wave arrival time at the station, time taken by EEW algorithm, transmission and processing delay. The study reveals that for Dehradun, Hardwar, Roorkee, Muzaffarnagar, Meerut, and Delhi the minimum calculated lead time is 5, 11, 20, 35, and 68 sec while the maximum lead time is 37, 36, 47, 59, and 90 sec, respectively. Such larger estimated lead times to these densely populated cities show that EEW can successfully work as one of the important real-time earthquake disaster reduction measures in Northern India.