USGS Earthquakes CLI

Every USGS earthquake feed and event query in one terminal, with offline SQLite cache, agent-native output, and a live watch mode.

Wraps the full USGS FDSN Event Service and all 20 GeoJSON summary feeds in a single binary. Adds a 30-day rolling local SQLite cache so search, sql, aftershocks, swarm-detect, top, and changes run instantly without the network. Built for seismologists, journalists, emergency managers, and agents that need to reason about earthquake activity programmatically.

Learn more at USGS Earthquakes.

Created by @tmchow (Trevin Chow).

Authentication

No authentication required. USGS earthquake services are fully public; doctor verifies reachability of both the FDSN Event base URL and the summary feeds.

Quick Start

# List M4.5+ earthquakes in the last 24h. Default for newsroom triage.
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli recent --min-magnitude 4.5 --json

# Pull the pre-built 'past week, significant' summary feed once.
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli feeds get significant_week --json

# Populate the local SQLite cache (30 days, M2.5+) so search/sql/aftershocks/top/changes work offline.
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli sync

# Rank recent events by composite editorial score (sig × alert × felt × tsunami).
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli top --window 24h --limit 10 --json

# Get a one-event briefing with PAGER, DYFI, tsunami, ShakeMap MMI, and product inventory.
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli brief us7000abcd --format markdown

# Investigate a mainshock's aftershock sequence from the local store.
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli aftershocks us7000abcd --radius-km 100 --days 30 --json

Unique Features

These capabilities aren't available in any other tool for this API.

Real-time monitoring

• watch — Long-running poll of a USGS summary feed with deduplication against the local store. Invokes an optional shell hook per new event for custom alerting.

  Reach for this when you want a long-running monitor over USGS earthquakes without writing a polling loop. Pluggable shell hook means it composes with notify-send, Slack curl, paging systems, anything.

  usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli watch --min-magnitude 5 --notify "echo {id}: {place}" --interval 60s
  

Cross-event analysis

• aftershocks — Show events within R km and T days after a mainshock, ordered by time. Local SQLite haversine query with FDSN fallback when uncached.

  Reach for this any time you have a mainshock event ID and need to see what came after. The single-call alternative is dozens of /query invocations stitched in jq.

  usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli aftershocks us7000abcd --radius-km 100 --days 30 --min-mag 3.0 --json
  

• swarm-detect — Detect time-space clusters in the local earthquake store. Grid-bucket clustering finds foreshock/aftershock sequences, volcanic swarms, and induced seismicity hotspots.

  Reach for this when monitoring a volcano, fault zone, or fracking region for unusual clustering. The output names each cluster with center, count, peak magnitude, and time range.

  usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli swarm-detect --bbox -122.5,46.5,-121.5,47.5 --window 7d --min-events 10 --cluster-radius-km 20 --json
  

• compare — Side-by-side comparison of two regions or two time periods. Returns parallel columns with counts, max magnitude, and total seismic energy.

  Reach for this when answering 'is region A more active than region B?' or 'is this region quieter than it used to be?'. Outputs delta percentages and energy ratios.

  usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli compare --region-a -122.5,37.5,-122.0,37.9 --region-b -118.5,33.8,-118.0,34.2 --window 30d --json
  

Agent-native output

• brief — Agent-ready briefing for a single earthquake: magnitude, place, PAGER alert, DYFI felt count, ShakeMap MMI, tsunami status, and product inventory.

  Reach for this in newsroom or Slack contexts where you need a one-event summary an editor or downstream agent can drop straight into copy. Includes the USGS event-page URL.

  usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli brief us7000abcd --format markdown
  

• top — Rank recent events by composite editorial score: significance × alert weight × felt count × tsunami flag. Default window 24h, limit 10.

  Reach for this when you need 'the events that matter right now' rather than 'all events by magnitude'. The composite score promotes felt + PAGER + tsunami over raw magnitude.

  usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli top --window 24h --limit 10 --score composite --json
  

Local state that compounds

• changes — Diff since the last sync: what events appeared, what events had magnitudes/depths/alerts revised, what events were retracted. Tracks USGS solution revisions over time. Returns 'no revisions recorded yet' until at least two sync runs have completed.

  Reach for this when a previously-automatic event might have just been reviewed by an analyst (revising magnitude or alert), or to answer 'what's new since I last looked?'

  usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli changes --since 24h --type revised --min-mag-delta 0.3 --json
  

• decode-id — Parse a USGS event ID into its source network code, sequence, and operator name. Joins the cached contributors dictionary for the network display name.

  Reach for this when you see an opaque USGS event ID (e.g. nc73947885, ak0202xyz) and need to know which network reported it before reading the data.

  usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli decode-id us7000abcd
  

Usage

Run usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli --help for the full command reference and flag list.

Commands

catalogs

USGS earthquake source catalogs (ANSS contributors and processing centers)

• usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli catalogs - List all source catalogs known to the FDSN Event service (XML response)

contributors

USGS earthquake data contributors

• usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli contributors - List all data contributors known to the FDSN Event service (XML response)

events

Search and retrieve earthquakes from the USGS FDSN Event service

• usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli events count - Count events matching the given filter, without returning event data (fast precheck before a full search)
• usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli events get - Fetch a single earthquake event by USGS event ID (e.g. us7000abcd)
• usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli events search - Search the USGS earthquake catalog with full FDSN parameter coverage

feeds

Pre-built GeoJSON earthquake summary feeds (updated every minute by USGS)

• usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli feeds <feed> - Fetch a named GeoJSON summary feed. Use one of: significant_{hour|day|week|month}, 4.5_{hour|day|week|month}, 2.5_{hour|day|week|month}, 1.0_{hour|day|week|month}, all_{hour|day|week|month}.

metadata

FDSN Event service metadata: enumerated values for every parameter

• usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli metadata - Show enum dictionaries for catalogs, contributors, event types, product types, and magnitude types

Output Formats

# Human-readable table (default in terminal, JSON when piped)
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli catalogs

# JSON for scripting and agents
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli catalogs --json

# Filter to specific fields
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli catalogs --json --select id,name,status

# Dry run — show the request without sending
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli catalogs --dry-run

# Agent mode — JSON + compact + no prompts in one flag
usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli catalogs --agent

Agent Usage

This CLI is designed for AI agent consumption:

• Non-interactive - never prompts, every input is a flag
• Pipeable - --json output to stdout, errors to stderr
• Filterable - --select id,name returns only fields you need
• Previewable - --dry-run shows the request without sending
• Read-only by default - this CLI does not create, update, delete, publish, send, or mutate remote resources
• Offline-friendly - sync/search commands can use the local SQLite store when available
• Agent-safe by default - no colors or formatting unless --human-friendly is set

Exit codes: 0 success, 2 usage error, 3 not found, 5 API error, 7 rate limited, 10 config error.

Health Check

usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli doctor

Verifies configuration and connectivity to the API.

Configuration

Config file: ~/.config/usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli/config.toml

Static request headers can be configured under headers; per-command header overrides take precedence.

Troubleshooting

Not found errors (exit code 3)

• Check the resource ID is correct
• Run the list command to see available items

API-specific

• Search or sql returns empty rows on a fresh install — Run usgs-earthquakes-pp-cli sync first — the local SQLite store is empty until sync populates it.
• FDSN /query returns 400 'limit must be ≤ 20000' — Lower --limit below 20000 or paginate with --offset; the FDSN cap is a hard ceiling.
• Repeated polling slows down or returns stale data — Use feeds get <feed> (e.g. feeds get all_hour) for high-cadence monitoring — USGS recommends summary feeds over /query for repeated polls.
• watch keeps exec'ing the notify hook during printing-press verify — Already handled: watch checks PRINTING_PRESS_VERIFY=1 and skips the hook in mock-mode subprocesses.

---

Sources & Inspiration

This CLI was built by studying these projects and resources:

• blake365/usgs-quakes-mcp — TypeScript
• DOI-USGS/dataretrieval-python — Python
• obspy/obspy — Python
• usgs-earthquake-api (doojin) — JavaScript
• exxamalte/python-aio-geojson-usgs-earthquakes — Python

Generated by CLI Printing Press