Reference · built on requestCommons signalEarth, seismic & volcanic

EarthScope FDSN Web Services

Station metadata and seismic waveforms from the NSF NGF data archive run by EarthScope Consortium, formerly the IRIS DMC.

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About

EarthScope Consortium operates the NSF National Geophysical Facilities data archive, which replaced the SAGE and GAGE facilities on 1 October 2025 and carries the former IRIS DMC services. Its FDSN web services at service.earthscope.org, with service.iris.edu redirecting, are fdsnws-station for network, station, channel, and instrument response metadata and fdsnws-dataselect for time-series data as miniSEED or GeoCSV. Companion irisws services cover federated catalogue lookup, instrument responses, synthetic seismograms, and MUSTANG data-quality metrics.

Through Fibric, an operator reads channel metadata and pulls short waveform windows around an event at your instrumented sites, then proposes a calibration or sensor ticket for your approval.

This is a reference listing. It documents what Fibric would read from EarthScope FDSN Web Services and what it could propose, based on the publisher's published interfaces. Fibric builds it under a managed deployment when you request it; selecting it here installs nothing.

Inputs

  • Network, station, channel, and response metadata from /fdsnws/station/1/query, selected by level and by net, sta, loc, cha
  • Metadata changed since a date through updatedafter, and stations inside a box or radius through the latitude and longitude filters
  • Time-series windows from /fdsnws/dataselect/1/query for a net, sta, loc, cha selection between start and end
  • Output as FDSN StationXML 1.1, text, geocsv, resp, or sacpz for metadata; miniseed or geocsv variants for data
  • Instrument response evaluation from /irisws/evalresp/1/ and federated channel lookup across data centres from /irisws/fedcatalog/1/
  • Data-quality measurements and noise spectra from the MUSTANG measurements, noise-psd, and noise-pdf services

Proposed actions

Read-only. This feed informs operators; it changes nothing.

Proposed actions are target capabilities. Every action runs propose-first and needs a validated deployment and the appropriate permissions.

What you can build

  • Check a structural sensor against a reference station

    When your own accelerometer reports shaking, the operator pulls the same window from the nearest archived station and proposes a sensor-health ticket if the two disagree.

    With Sensor Health

  • Keep instrument response metadata current

    The operator polls updatedafter on fdsnws-station for your channels and proposes a calibration record whenever a response epoch changes.

    With Calibration Due

  • Watch for channels that stop reporting

    The operator requests a short recent window from fdsnws-dataselect for each of your channels with nodata=204; an empty response for an expected window becomes a data-freshness note for review.

    With Data Freshness

Requirements

  • The FDSN network, station, location, and channel codes for the instruments you care about
  • HTTPS with TLS 1.2 or later; plain HTTP requests are redirected
  • A SeedLink client if you need continuous real-time data, since the web services are not for repeated polling
  • An acknowledgement of the NSF NGF data archive operated by EarthScope Consortium under NSF award 2435260
Authentication
Open data needs no key. Restricted data requires FDSNWS credentials generated in the Credentials tab of an EarthScope user account.

Limits

  • EarthScope asks that dataselect requests cover at most one station for a 24-hour period
  • Repeated polling of the web services for continuous real-time data is against the usage policy; use SeedLink
  • No event catalogue: the fdsnws-event path returns 404, so pair this signal with an event feed
  • The dataselect parameters quality, minimumlength, longestonly, repository, and szsrecs have been retired; SAC and text output are not supported

Access and pricing

Reference listing. Public feed access is separate from Fibric integration. If you request this feed, your quote covers the build, usage, and support.

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Questions and answers

Does EarthScope still serve an FDSN event catalogue?
No. The service index lists only fdsnws-station and fdsnws-dataselect among the FDSN services, and /fdsnws/event/1/ returns 404. Use a separate event feed for earthquake locations.
Which formats do the station and dataselect services return?
fdsnws-station returns FDSN StationXML 1.1 by default, plus text, geocsv, resp, and sacpz. fdsnws-dataselect returns miniSEED by default, plus geocsv, geocsv.inline, geocsv.slist, and geocsv.zip. SAC and text output are not supported.
How should you cite data from the archive?
EarthScope's suggested wording is that data were accessed from the NSF NGF data archive operated by EarthScope Consortium under NSF award 2435260. Cite the seismic network's DOI as well, which FDSN lists at fdsn.org/networks.
Ask about EarthScope FDSN Web Services

Ask about the capabilities and requirements in this listing.

For project-specific requirements, contact Fibric.

This Commons signal listing is developed, published, and supported by Fibric. It reads public data published by EarthScope Consortium, NSF National Geophysical Facilities data archive (service.earthscope.org, legacy service.iris.edu). Upstream agencies and projects are the property of their respective owners, who are not affiliated with Fibric and do not sponsor or endorse this listing. Trademark policy