Original Concept: "Living in southern California, earthquakes are a frequent occurrence. with thousands of earthquakes a year in the region, it can be difficult to distinguish between a minor but real tremor and something else (e.g., a heavy truck passing by). This project is a proposal for a system that can detect tremors through the use of hardware components (Arduino) and sensors (accelerometer). In addition, with the advent of social networking sites such as Twitter, news spreads quickly through word of mouth. Traditional information websites, like the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), will take longer to confirm whether an earthquake did actually happen. Therefore, the proposed device will look at Twitter activity to see if there is a heightened frequency of local posts regarding earthquake, and determine whether the tremor is likely to be an actual earthquake.

The actual prototype constructed implemented a majority of the proposed features, with Twitter polling simulated and the fetching of official information left out completely.

Project partner:
Trina Choontanom
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Technology:
Hardware: Arduino
Web interface: PHP