EQUIVALENT LINEAR VELOCITY FOR FIRST ARRIVAL PICKING OF SEISMIC REFRACTION

Methods and systems including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for utilizing equivalent linear velocity for first arrival picking of seismic refraction. In one aspect, a method includes receiving data for the shot gather record, generating a diving wave equation curve for a particular parameter pair of multiple parameter pairs, and integrating the shot gather record data corresponding to the diving wave equation curve over a selected range of offsets of the shot gather to generate an equivalent linear velocity value for the particular parameter pair and the shot gather record data, selecting, from the equivalent linear velocity values for the plurality of parameter pairs, a greatest equivalent linear velocity value of the equivalent linear velocity values, the greatest equivalent linear velocity value corresponding to a first-arrival parameter pair, and determining, using the first-arrival parameter pair, a set of first-arrival onsets for the selected sub-range of offsets.