  Smartphone-based earthquake early warning systems implemented by citizen
science initiatives are characterized by a significant variability in their
smartphone network geometry. This has an direct impact on the earthquake
detection capability and performance of the system. Here, a simulation
framework based on the Monte Carlo method is implemented for making inference
on relevant quantities of the earthquake detection such as the detection
distance from the epicentre, the detection delay and the warning time for
people exposed to high ground shaking levels. The framework is applied to
Haiti, which has experienced deadly earthquakes in the past decades, and to the
network of the Earthquake Network citizen science initiative, which is popular
in the country. It is discovered that relatively low penetrations of the
initiative among the population allow to offer a robust early warning service,
with warning times up to 12 second for people exposed to intensities between
7.5 and 8.5 of the modified Mercalli scale.
