It is a day we will remember for the rest of our lives. 12.51pm, James was in his church office and Amy was on the school playground, when the earthquake struck. We'd felt big aftershocks since last Septembers EQ, but this did feel like a big one. Out on the streets, people were soon talking about buildings falling in the city centre, and casualties, and sadly it was true. Amy stayed at school comforting and reassuring children until they were collected, James went to CNB Primary school offering them support, before knocking on local doors to make sure people were OK. Ian & Jen were at home, and thankfully everyone was OK - just a bit shaken up. They flew out of NZ on their pre booked flights the next day after a night of aftershocks! We could see a lot of liquifaction (around 400,000 tonnes in total of this sandy silty material that came through the ground onto the streets, onto peoples property and into some peoples homes), fooding and a lot of building damage. It is New Zealand's 2nd worst natural disaster (after the Hawkes Bay EQ of 1931) and is estimated to cost NZ$15 billion. We experienced over 360 aftershocks in the next week (mag 3+) and as of July, our city will have experienced over 8,000 aftershocks!
Our house had a few bit of contents damage, cracks in a few walls, and is on a slight lean but because it's made from wood - it just swayed & rocked (the brick and concrete houses cracked and caused a lot more damage). Here is the scene we came home too:
Here are a few photos we took of the damaged streets after the Feb EQ:
Thankfully we weren't on this bridge...
Here are some general media photo's taken on Feb 22nd, which gives you an idea of the devastation:
It received worldwide media coverage and had all the major relief charities working in the city, to help people in the initial shelter, food, sewage, warmth needs. Millions of dollars is being poured out in relief for the city, and although some people have left, the majority have stayed and are preparing to rebuild. However, when we look at this disaster in light of other natural disasters - we were still being looked after. In fact, we are blessed that these Earthquakes have only caused the damage they did, as natural disasters around the world have caused devastation in the past century:
Date | Magnitude | Location | Number of Deaths |
1/12/2010 | 7.0 | Haiti | 316,000 |
27/7/1976 | 7.5 | Tangshan, China | 242,769 |
26/12/2004 | 9.1 | Sumatra | 227,898 |
01/09/1923 | 7.9 | Kanto, Japan | 142,800 |
05/10/1948 | 7.3 | Turkmenistan | 110,000 |
12/05/2008 | 7.9 | Sichuan, China | 87,587 |
08/10/2005 | 7.6 | Pakistan | 86,000 |
28/12/1908 | 7.2 | Messina, Italy | 72,000 |
31/05/1970 | 7.9 | Chimbote, Peru | 70,000 |
20/06/1990 | 7.4 | Iran | 50,000 |
26/12/2003 | 6.6 | Iran | 31,000 |
11/03/2011 | 9.0 | Japan | 28,050 |
26/01/2001 | 7.6 | Gujarat, India | 20,085 |
17/08/1999 | 7.6 | Turkey | 17,118 |
29/09/1993 | 6.2 | Latur-Killari, India | 9,748 |
19/09/1985 | 8.0 | Mexico | 9,500 |
26/05/2006 | 6.3 | Indonesia | 5,749 |
16/01/1995 | 6.9 | Kobe, Japan | 5,502 |
22/05/1960 | 9.5 | Chile | 1,655 |
21/02/2011 | 6.3 | Christchurch, NZ | 181 |
04/08/2010 | 7.1 | Christchurch, NZ | 0 |
This does not include other lists of floods, avalanches, blizzards, volcanoes, cyclones, famines, heat waves and diseases, all of which have also killed tens of thousands of people at various times over the past century too. The Japan Earthquake a few weeks later brought us back to earth and our focus now is on the rebuild and the future!
