SEATTLE — As World Cup fans cheer on their teams at Seattle Stadium, the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network is tracking all the excitement - with science!
The Pacific Northwest Seismic Network (PNSN) is the regional seismic network for Washington and Oregon, with more than 700 seismic stations across both states.
“Our real job is to record earthquake and volcanic activity in the states, but it turns out some of the instruments we use for that are also really good for measuring and recording fan reactions to big sporting events," says Elizabeth Angell, who leads the External Engagement team at PNSN.
So how did PNSN start monitoring ‘sports seismology’ in Seattle?
It dates back to the other kind of football, the Seahawks’ 2011 playoff game, when the legendary Beast Quake was born.
Back in 2011, PNSN had a permanent seismic station right across the street from Lumen Field, currently known as Seattle Stadium. Back then, the seismic station was named the KDK after the Kingdome.
The seismic center’s equipment just happened to pick up the aftermath of Marshawn Lynch’s 67-yard ‘Beast Quake’ touchdown, and after that information was found and publicized, the rest is history.
The equipment
Given the community interest, PNSN went about temporarily deploying several seismic instruments throughout Seattle Stadium.
As of January 2026, there are seven strong-motion seismometers set up around the stadium to track fan reaction, PNSN says. There’s one at the ground level near the 50-yard line, four at the corners at the 300 level, and the last two are at the Hawk’s Nest.
The seismometers don’t pick up any sound — but instead pick up the literal shaking and movement of the ground and the stadium.
Since the World Cup started, PNSN staff members have gathered to watch the game and the seismic readings simultaneously. Their equipment is incredibly quick, so quick, in fact, that they’ll often get advance notice of an exciting moment during the game.
“We’ll get the signal. We’ll be like, ‘Is that a goal? Is something happening?’ but we can see that line start to spike as the crowd gets rowdy, and then sometimes, you know, 5, 10, whatever seconds later, we’ll watch it play out on the screen because of the streaming delay,” says Angell. “So that’s really cool. We get like an advance warning.”
World Cup seismology spikes
Angell says they’ve seen quite a large fan response pop up on their equipment since the World Cup first began, particularly during the USA vs Australia game last week.
“Of the World Cup events so far, the largest reaction we’ve seen was definitely Alex Freeman’s goal, the second goal that the U.S. Men’s National Team scored against Australia,” says Angell. “We actually saw a couple of distinct spikes: first for the goal itself, and then this kind of pause as it was ruled offside, then it was overruled, and the goal was allowed to stand, and there was another huge spike of fan reaction when the goal was confirmed by the referees.”
Angell adds, “It’s really fun; you can kind of see the pattern of the crowd reaction at those different moments, and that one, I think, was probably about 68% of the amplitude of the Beast Quake, so it’s in the top ten that we’ve recorded so far.”
If you want to follow along with the seismic readings during the games, or check them out after, you can visit PNSN’s real-time seismic data website at: pnsn.org/experiment/2026-world-cup-in-seattle
A link to each match will pop up about an hour before the game starts, and you can watch along with the science!
PNSN says tracking this ‘sports seismology’ is a fun way to do outreach and remind people that we do live in earthquake country and that it’s important to be prepared.
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