Federal funds bolster efforts to build an earthquake early warning system in Alaska

Alaskans are one small step closer to having a system that can send alerts to their phones seconds before an earthquake strikes. Those alerts will come from a U.S. Geological Survey early warning system called ShakeAlert, which some states and countries have had for years.

In late February, Congress allocated $34.9 million to the USGS to expand ShakeAlert. Of that, $2 million will go toward bringing it to Alaska.

State seismologist Michael West, who runs the Alaska Earthquake Center, has been working for more than a decade to raise the system to the north. They still need several years and millions of dollars before earthquake early warning becomes a reality here, but investment by Congress is encouraging, he said.

“There’s a lot to figure out, and the pace of early warning is certainly going to depend on support and engagement and all of those things,” West said. “But I feel like we’re at a turning point. We’re starting to make this a reality.”

ShakeAlert works because earthquakes release waves of energy that travel at different speeds. The P wave, which moves quickly but is usually too weak for people to feel it, gets farther and farther ahead of the slower and potentially harmful S wave as it travels across the Earth.

If Alaska had an earthquake early warning system, it would rely on sensors close to the quake to pick up those P waves and relay that information to the Alaska Earthquake Center in Fairbanks. The system then sends an alert that includes an estimate of how strong the vibration is.

Depending on where the earthquake occurs, these electronic alerts could reach people before a strong shaking occurs. Advocates of early warning systems say they make people safer by, for example, allowing teachers to tell students to take shelter under their desks.

West said Alaska’s federal delegation — especially Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who sits on the Senate Appropriations Committee — helped secure seed money for the project. Murkowski said in an email statement that expanding the program to Alaska is a priority and described it as “extremely successful” on the West Coast.

“As the most seismically active state in the union, I am focused on investing in the tools needed to keep Alaskans safe from earthquakes,” she said in her statement.

The Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute, which houses the Alaska Earthquake Center, estimates the cost of the first phase of the project at $66 million, plus $12 million annually in operating costs. But the $2 million provided by Congress will give the earthquake center more resources to lay the groundwork.

West said he envisions rolling out the app where people in South Central, Kodiak, Fairbanks and the Prince William Sound area will be the first to get ShakeAlerts alerts.

“These are the areas of the state that have the highest seismic risk,” West said. “We will start these efforts there for two reasons: One, we have a mix of high risk and population. Also, we have some of the best infrastructure to start with. This area already has reasonably strong seismic baselines.”

West said state funding for the program will be crucial in the coming years, although the program is not under consideration in the state budget this year.

Copyright 2026 KUAC

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