NASA’s GUARDIAN Tsunami Detection Tech Catches Wave in Real Time

A recent tsunami launched by an earthquake of magnitude 8.8 off the Kamchatka peninsula in Russia sent pressure waves to the upper layer of the atmosphere, NASA scientists reported. Although tsunami has not undergone general damage, it was an early test for a detection system under development in the agency’s propulsion laboratory in southern California.

Called Guardian (GNSS Upt Atmospheric in real time information on disasters and the alert network), experimental technology “worked in all its extent,” said Camille Martire, one of his JPL developers. The system reported distortions in the atmosphere and has issued notifications to experts in the matter subscribed as little as 20 minutes after the earthquake. He confirmed the signs of the tsunami which approached around 30 to 40 minutes before the waves touched Hawaii and the Pacific sites on July 29 (local time).

“These additional minutes to know that something happens could make a real difference in terms of warning communities on the way,” said JPL scientist Siddharth Krishnamoorthy.

Time outings close to Guardian must be interpreted by experts trained to identify the signs of tsunamis. But it is already one of the fastest monitoring tools of the genre: in about 10 minutes after receiving data, it can produce an instantaneous of the rumble of a tsunami reaching the high atmosphere.

Guardian’s goal is to increase existing early alert systems. A key question after a major underwater earthquake is whether a tsunami has been generated. Today, forecastists use seismic data as an indirect indicator to predict if and where a tsunami could occur, and they count on instruments at sea to confirm that a tsunami passes. The deep pressure sensors remain the gold stallion when it comes to size the waves, but they are expensive and sparse in the places.

“The NASA tutor can help fill the gaps,” said Christopher Moore, director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Center for Tsunami Research. “It provides another information, another point of precious data, which can help us determine, yes, we must make the call to evacuate.”

Moore noted that Guardian adds a unique perspective: he is able to detect the movement of the surface of the sea high above the earth, on a global scale and in almost real time.

Bill Fry, president of the United Nations Technical Working Group, responsible for the tsunami, early warning in the Pacific, said that Guardian is part of a technological “paradigm change”. By directly observing the dynamics of the oceans from space, “Guardian is absolutely something that we, in the early alert community, love to help follow the next generation forecasts.”

Guardian takes advantage of tsunami physics. During a tsunami, many squares of the ocean surface can go up and fall almost in unison. This moves a large amount of air above, sending low frequency sound waves and accelerating gravity upwards to space. The waves interact with the particles loaded with the high atmosphere – the ionosphere – where they slightly deform the radio signals descending towards GPS scientific solar stations and other positioning and synchronization satellites. These satellites are known collectively as the global navigation satellite system (GNSS).

While GNSS treatment methods on earth are correct for such distortions, Guardian uses them as clues.

The software travels a data transmitted to more than 350 continuous GNSS soil stations worldwide. It can potentially identify evidence of a tsunami up to around 745 miles (1,200 kilometers) from a given station. In ideal situations, vulnerable coastal communities near a GNSS station could know when a tsunami was heading and the authorities would have up to 1 hour and 20 minutes to evacuate the low zones, thus saving lives and goods.

The network of GNSS stations around the world is key to this effort supported by the Space Geodesy project of NASA and the GNSS global network, as well as the global differential JPL GPS network which transmits the data in real time.

The Kamchatka event offered a timely case study for Guardian. One day before the earthquake off the northeast coast of Russia, the team had deployed two new elements that were in preparation for years: an artificial intelligence to exploit signals of interest and a prototype messaging system that accompanies it.

The two were put to the test when one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded caused a tsunami traveling hundreds of kilometers per hour through the Pacific Ocean. Having been trained to identify the types of atmospheric distortions caused by a tsunami, the goalkeeper reported the human revision signals and was informed of experts in the matter.

In particular, tsunamis are most often caused by large underwater earthquakes, but not always. Volcanic eruptions, underwater landslides and certain weather conditions in certain geographic places can all produce dangerous waves. An advantage of Guardian is that he does not require information on what caused a tsunami; It can rather detect that it has been generated and can then alert the authorities to help minimize loss of life and goods.

Although there is no miracle solution to prevent a tsunami from giving land, “Guardian has real potential to help by providing open access to this data,” said Adrienne Moseley, co -director of the Australian Australian warning center. “Tsunamis do not respect national borders. We must be able to share data throughout the region to be able to carry out assessments on the threat of all the links. ”

To find out more about Guardian, visit:

https://guardian.jpl.nasa.gov

Jane J. Lee / Andrew Wang
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California.
626-379-6874 / 818-354-0307
jane.j.lee@jpl.nasa.gov / Andrew.wang@jpl.nasa.gov

Written by Sally Younger

2025-117