Brittany Washington

August 24th, 2017

August 11th was my last day in MD and possibly my last day around the UMD staff. Oh, wait I forgot about AGU-- yay! My last few weeks were bittersweet and overwhelming. It was bittersweet because I'm leaving the people who I spent almost my whole summer with, but of course I was very happy to see my family and friends again. 
I'm also happy I got to see my high school "dream college " Howard and visit Baltimore again. 
Also, it was a bit overwhelming because I had to make sure that I had enough data for my AGU poster otherwise I would have to come back (and this time it won't be on IRIS budget). So that idea was constantly on my mind. I also spent most of my last few days on my poster. 

A bit of advice from an engineering student who didn't take a coding course yet:
If you're new to this-- gain some patience especially with Matlab, Python, etc. You will need every ounce of patience with these programs. 

You will miss your family and friends, but it's only 8-10 weeks. Trust me it goes by quickly and you won't realize that it's over so get your work done--you'll see your family soon. 
And finally, make friends with everyone you can. Like the post docs, suitemates/roommates or at least anyone whom you see on a regular basis. You never know what they can help you with. 

Signing out, 
Brittany Washington
 

August 24th, 2017

August 11th was my last day in MD and possibly my last day around the UMD staff. Oh, wait I forgot about AGU-- yay! My last few weeks were bittersweet and overwhelming. It was bittersweet because I'm leaving the people who I spent almost my whole summer with, but of course I was very happy to see my family and friends again. 
I'm also happy I got to see my high school "dream college " Howard and visit Baltimore again. 
Also, it was a bit overwhelming because I had to make sure that I had enough data for my AGU poster otherwise I would have to come back (and this time it won't be on IRIS budget). So that idea was constantly on my mind. I also spent most of my last few days on my poster. 

A bit of advice from an engineering student who didn't take a coding course yet:
If you're new to this-- gain some patience especially with Matlab, Python, etc. You will need every ounce of patience with these programs. 

You will miss your family and friends, but it's only 8-10 weeks. Trust me it goes by quickly and you won't realize that it's over so get your work done--you'll see your family soon. 
And finally, make friends with everyone you can. Like the post docs, suitemates/roommates or at least anyone whom you see on a regular basis. You never know what they can help you with. 

Signing out, 
Brittany Washington
 

July 14th, 2017

Hi,

in the past few weeks I found a couple local EQ’S, something I suspect to be harmonic tremors that are between the frequencies of 0.1-10Hz and the tremors last for at least 6-11 hours. I also have some glitches and array shots in my dataset. Also, for fun I attached some whale songs seismograms! Right now I’m trying to find if I have any icebergs singing in my dataset (yes, iceberg singing is an actual thing…apparently I have an entire performance in my dataset.) In other news, I completed a few of my goals within the past weeks; I just forgot to share it with you guys! I went on my first hiking experience, although it was like a beginners trail, I still went by myself and came back in one piece. And I explored the city on July 4th with my suite mate—we went to Howard and Baltimore to her family’s BBQ. Here are the seismograms I promised you. 
 

--- This is a seismogram of array shots. 

The array shots were calibrated from shots coming off a ship at a set interval. The ship was traveling along a track that's why you see the amplitude of the shots increase because as the ship gets closer to the station, the louder the shots gets.

--- This is a seismogram of an local EQ

As you can see at the top of the hour, there's a an  event with a very strong frequency so we suspect the event to be an local EQ...the other high, fading frequency you see is a glitch, the instruments we used are really old so there are minor glitches in my dataset. 

--- This is a seismogram of whale songs!

We suspect it's whales because whales were noted around our stations back in 2000-01, also we suspect they're singing or something because the amplitude and frequency are almost the same and the intervals they're singing are randomized.

--- This is a seismogram of harmonic tremors

I'm guessing these are harmonic tremors...my station are close to an volcanic arc so it could be volcanic tremors or iceberg tremors. I'm not sure...just taking a guess. Maybe you can tell me what it is if you know.

Bye!

July 6th, 2017

Independence Day was beautiful in Maryland, I got a chance to go to my suitemates alumni--Howard University and it was not disappointing. I thoroughly enjoyed myself...then we went to Baltimore for her family BBQ...god I love everything barbequed. But anywayyy...my project so far is going as ok.... I think. My biggest success is that I found a local icequake (the seismogram is beautiful...I'll post it when I get to the office tomorrow.) My biggest challenge so far is that I can't distinguish between the tremor I'm seeing is iceberg tremor or volcanic tremor. So, I'm spending the next week trying to distinguish between that.

See you next time!

June 23rd, 2017

On the next episode of Brittany's dietary needs:

So, I finally went shopping for real food, my roommates took me to their local grocery store (I love them for that) thank you for worrying, but rest assured I am no longer eating Tuna or Hot pockets (not even in my regular college semesters.)

Anyway, about my elevator speech: It took me about 5 hours to complete (I had several breaks in between writing it) It was quite hard to do because it’s hard to understand and even harder to sum up all the information and then convey it in a clear manner. I don't want my audience to be bored to death. Capturing the attention and keeping it alive for a couple of seconds is not an easy task. I don't want my audience to feel like I'm lecturing them, but I also don't want them to feel as though I don't know what I'm talking about.

Beside AGU another place I can use this speech is everyday conversations in the "science world"...in other words ---- I'm using this speech now. When I meet new people, they ask me what do I do, and I use this elevator speech (or versions of it) to describe what I do and this is also useful to create some conversation with potential advisors/mentors.

June 15th, 2017

The data set I'm working with was collected on the Antarctica peninsula​ back in the 2000's. Like I said in my previous post, this data has essentially been in  the archieves for almost 2 decades so me and my mentors, to my understanding, are the first people to look at it since it was collected. So basically, the purpose of this study was to intially find seismic activity for X amount of time, but the ship crew and a researcher named Yosio thought that the geopohones should stay out just a little bit longer than expected just out of curiosity. The data collected is the data I will be working with this summer,

Some strengths and weaknesses this dataset has are:

Weakness: There's a lot of whale noise and it's kind of hard to distingush between "important earthquake stuff" and simple whale songs..

Strengths: When you do find awesome earthquake stuff, it'll blow you away. There's not many EQ's, or any seimic activty, but the few that are found are pretty cool.

This is raw data I'm working with, I have to find the most interesting events and categorize them based on biological, volcanic and/or teleseismic events. Eventually, I would be able locate the events based on P wave arrivals. Then plot my locations to see if their source is (for example) around a volcanic arc, random or etc.

Finally, based on the rubric, I would really like to become proficient in the use of software and technology to obtain and collect data. Specifically, I would like to learn more about Matlab because as an engineering major I'm almost certain that I will be using one of the operating systems in the near future (such as this fall because I have a class on it, yay!) So far I'm looking up tutorials to perfect my craft in Matlab and asking the post docs for help because they have been using it for years so they know what they're doing!

Until next time...bye.

June 13th, 2017

Hi readers,

First, let me explain my title: College Park is a small town in Maryland and the grocery stores are like miles away from me. The only ones that are close to me is Target (which is oddly expensive in MD ) and Whole Foods, which is modestly expensive anywhere you go. So HotPockets are my new delights this summer, more specifically the pizza flavor ones. Anyway, yesterday I met with my mentors, Ved and Nick who are kind, caring, and funny. I am very comfortable with them and for a person who was born and raised in NJ/NY that's a little odd. If you don't know anything about NJ/NY then here's a little fun fact (or my opinion..) a lot of us have our guards up allllllll the time. Like all the time, even when we're sleep. So it's kind of refreshing that my internal defense system isn't activated when I'm around them (This makes me sound like a robot or something so let me move on..)

Anyway, I finally understand my project after almost 5 weeks of getting accepted into IRIS. My purpose (not in life lol) is to figure out the source of some of the unusual seismic activity around the Antartica Peninsula. Then do analysis of where the EQ's are happening, and what motion gave rise to the EQ. Afterwards, break them down into categories such as: biological, volcanic, teleseismic, and local EQ's. What's interesting is that this data was collected in the 2000's. So it just sat in the archieves for almost 2 decades. My mentors or I have no clue what I will find in the data, but if it's anything life changing I will let you guys know first.

June 5th, 2017

Hey guys, I would like to start off by saying Maryland is beautiful. (I'm a city girl so I love the city vibe...thanks Micheal!) My flight was delayed twice so it was a rough ride getting here, but I'm here! I would like to accomplish a few things: a broader understanding to the operating systems (Matlab preferably) and seismology​, go on my first hiking experience​ independently and explore this new city! I would tell you how my first week goes in my next post, until then, live your life to the fullest. Adios! ( I said this in the last post and I will say it in every post, don't mind my spelling errors.)

May 31st, 2017

Hey guys, firstly thanks for reading. I would like to describe my first week at New Mexico, as a city girl, this is allllll new to me. I usually don't wake up at 7:30am to eat breakfast, I usually get up around 2:00pm (only in the summer, and sometimes on the weekend during the semester.) Also, I usually don't eat breakfast, sleep usually constitutes as my meal for breakfast. All the lectures and fieldwork is new to me. I'm an Engineering major, we never heard of sesimic waves! Well we have, but not in depth like this. Coming into the orientaion I was very confindent of my success for the summer, now halfway through orientation I'm not feeling so confident because I never took a coding class and I dont know a single thing about seimic waves. So I'll keep you posted! Wish me luck, Bye!

Week 1 out of 10

(Any spelling erros, please ignore, I am not an English major) thanks!