Hokuriku Observatory

This observatory was established in 1970 to observe microearthquake activity in the Hokuriku region, extending over Fukui, Ishikawa, Gifu and Shiga Prefectures. Particularly Fukui Prefecture, in which this observatory is located, has many active faults and a history of large earthquakes. Therefore, this observatory is situated at a suitable site for earthquake prediction researches.

This observatory has six sub-stations of microearthquakes and the observational data are telemetered to the Research Center for Earthquake Prediction in Uji City. These wave data are recorded, processed and analyzed at "Laboratory for Data Processing and Analysis", together with the data from all other observatories of the Center.

This observatory has an observation tunnel with a total length of several hundred meters in which many kinds of observations have been carried out, including wide band and high dynamic range seismometers, tiltmeters, 3-dimensional fault displacement detectors and self-potential meters.