All you Kiwis OK down there in South Island??

[Jennings]

A 7.0 earthquake is nothing to sneeze at! Hope everybody down there is okay... Looks like Christchurch took a real knocking.

J

[SBARC]

7.0 is nasty!!!.....what sort of building materials do they use there?

[MiG Mongoose]

I live in Rangiora, a few kms North of Christchurch, where the ground is a bit more solid, so there is not too much damage here, but Christchurch itself has been hit hard, buildings have collapsed, water and power is out in many places.

I myself am OK, just an RC plane off the shelf and a few skewed pictures on the wall, not sure about others closer to the source of the earthquake, I hope everybody is alright.

By the way, magnitude was 7.1, initally thought to be 7.4

Edited September 4, 2010 by MiG Mongoose

[steve007]

Im in Christchurch and it was no fun. Road outside my house looks a mess but the inside is ok. And my models are still in one piece!

[Raymond]

modern buildings appear fine, the older brick buildings dont seem to be so lucky!

[Skyraider Maniac]

Glad to hear ya'll are ok! that's one heck of a quake!

[Mumbles]

Just a note for the non residents, it is "The South Island", not just "South" on its own .

My niece is down there at the moment but is fine, only her flight home has been delayed due to the airport being closed earlier.

No reported fatalities, two reported seriously injured, with numerous other minor injuries. Earthquake preparedness has been part of building codes and the general psyche for a long time here, and appears to have done its job engineering wise at least, which is very encouraging. There are a lot of severely damaged buildings being shown in the media, but a lot appear intact as well (that is my impression at least, not actually being there). There are also cracks in roads and fields and the like. The place doesn't appear to have been flattened Haiti style (which was slightly lesser magnitude), but the damage level is very significant in comparison to other recent earthquakes in NZ, easily qualifying as a major event locally and I am glad I wasn't there.

Should be a good wake up call for people around the country (and Wellington where I am in particular, since we are almost guaranteed a big shake sometime, and this earthquake hasn't changed the odds of that in any way) to make sure their emergency kits are in order. Ironically we slept through it at my place, and didn't hear anything about it until about 8 hours after it happened.

Respect and best of luck to all the Cantabs riding out the afteshocks and the weather for the next few days .

Edited September 4, 2010 by Mumbles

[moeggo]

I just heard from my family thats down in Christchurch.. My Aunt's farm in Darfield where the earthquake was centered, she had small amount damage to her house.

The chimney has fallen off and there is a few things that fell off the wall's etc.... and their water well is gone but their water tower is still standing... So by the sounds of it they were very lucky! But they still have no power or phone lines

My other aunt thats lives closer to the city is fine... only a couple of book cases that have fallen over....

[GreyGhost]

Prayers and well wishes for everyone in Kiwi Nation ...

-Gregg

[Anthony in NZ]

Hey Guys

Thanks for the concern. It was pretty scary, all hell broke loose at 4:30 this morning. My wife and son and I have been running to doorways several times since. We have had some pretty decent aftershocks too. Actually it was he noise that suprised me early on. You can really hear them coming. It sounds kind of like a freight train hurtling toward the house before it starts shaking.

We have faired well however we have some friends and family who have structural problems etc. We live in Rangiora also and it looks like we will be having 2 families stay with us tonight as their houses arent safe.

5 min down the road is pretty badly damaged and many areas cordoned off. The police have just put in a curfew for the central city area as well.

Considering the magnitude we have all done ok. No one killed is a testament to the stritct building codes we have here etc.

They are telling us to probably expect another magnitude 6 within the next 24hrs........oh great!

Thanks for your concern gents, its much appreciated!!!

Cheers

Anthony, Belynda and cameron

Edited September 4, 2010 by Anthony in NZ

[Skyraider Maniac]

They are telling us to probably expect another magnitude 6 within the next 24hrs........oh great!

holy moly! crazy! is that normal to have them so close together like that??? My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family, and everyone else out there!

[SBARC]

Amazing no one was killed.

With the large after shocks....I'd be breaking out the camping gear and living in a tent I the backyard......but I guess it's a bit cool for that this time of year. Haiti had structures that were great for hurricanes......but not so great for earthquakes. I often ownder how we'll do on the west coast of Canada when our big earthquake comes some day.

[Alternative 4]

It woke me up!!

Everything seems fine though, feel bad for the 85 year old lady whose wall fell down

There are some really lucky people in Christchurch

[jagewa]

Well here in Christchurch we had a bit of an early start this morning, wake, shake, rattle, roll and crash! at 4 30 this morning, kids a bit unnerved, but we are all well.

7.1 magnitude and about 30kms west of us at 10kms depth.

No water till about lunch time, so had to drink wine! it gave us enough time clear up, set up toilet facilities in the garden, (have to keep 'er in doors happy you know..) and no power until about 6pm tonight.

All our extended families were fine too, and I heard McDonalds were doing a rip roaring trade!

Only casualties in our house were my models which all took a first flight, had crash landings and suffered some kind of damage, and we had a smashed bottle of wine!

We are fine for food, and can cook on a gas barbecue if needed, we have a new wood burner, so heating isn't a problem either, weeing and poohing in the garden is fine, but the lack of water really concerned me. As soon as the water came back on, I filled up an old home brew barrel with water, just in case it goes off again.

We went to help my elderly in-laws, a kitchen to clean up, and a mess in the garage. On the way we saw quite a few houses with chimneys knocked over,

and lots of sand volcanoes in certain streets,

and funny hillocks in the playing grounds.

a saving grace it has been a beautiful blue skied day today.

A lot of damaged older buildings in the CBD, there is a curfew in the CBD tonight, have heard of one person seriously injured, a portion of the city still has sewage and water problems.

Quite a lot of after shakes too, about 24 so far, a couple of biggies about ten minutes ago.

Overall we have been VERY VERY lucky, and thankful.

Thanks for everyone's concern.

Cheers

Jim

[Mumbles]

holy moly! crazy! is that normal to have them so close together like that???

Yes apparently, after a big lurch the fault in question will take a bit of time to settle down. Media have been reporting 20+ aftershocks in the 4-5 range in the 14 hours after the main event.

Amazing no one was killed. :P

There is a certain feeling that Christchurch may have dodged a bullet casualty wise, in that the earthquake occured at 0435 local, when the streets were empty and most were at home. Looking at the images around tonight if this had occured during a busier time of the day it could have been a lot worse.

[SBARC]

To be honest I can't think of a better outcome from a 7.0 earthquake. Great photos of the local damage.....it appear the building codes did their job.

[SBARC]

Here's some video of the damage on Youtube. Check out the twisted train tracks. :D

[Adam Baker]

Wow, those train tracks are just insane. I remember similar scenes after some of the earthquakes I went through whiling living on Southern California in the early 90's.

[HOLMES]

I just saw on the news and the twisted train tracks, the roads cracked and open tumbling down broken buildings/homes look so devastating......

...Hope you guys are all okay and MY prayers and thoughts are with you al......

I also saw on the news at the same time as this Earthquake that an aircraft has taken off at a tourist place on the SOUTH ISLAND

with several tourists on board, and American, ABriton and two more tourists, including 4 locals from there and in total 9 have been killed...the aircraft crashed as soon as it took off and burst into flames.

This crash was not cause the the Earthquake. MY condolences to those families and friends....

what a sad tragic day for New Zealand...

[SBARC]

Had this happened during business hours there could have been several hundred pople killed. NZ was very lucky. Also they said the quake was centred 10 miles (or was it KM?) below the surface. I think that was another lucky thing as that would help to absorbed the waves of energy from the quake. Did anyone hear any quake sounds during the quake? I've been in some shallow quakes and there is a load bang......much like a large truck hit the corner of the house. Quakes are all so different.....some come rolling in and other just hit fast and hard like an explosion. The worst part of a quake the first time you experience it is you sit there confused not knowing what is happening. It's only after you've experienced a few earthquakes that you know what it is when it happens again.

[moeggo]

It would be Km Steve, measurement in miles is hardy used here...

Yes, indeed Christchurch was very lucky. It happened during a business day there woukd been quite a lot of deaths as Christchurch is the second largest city in NZ.

From what I have heard from family down there it sounded like a huge frieght train going past you. Which sounds normal for NZ. The few that I have noticed in Wellington, sounds the same. I am kinda surprized that the quake hit Christchurch... As one of the main fault lines runs striaght though Wellington and the Hawkes Bay..

[richter111]

I read on MSNBC that a new fault line was created from the quakes

[Mumbles]

I read on MSNBC that a new fault line was created from the quakes

The gist I got from the experts here was not that it was created per se, just there are a few in that area that they don't know a lot about or have mapped in detail. Historically Christchurch hasn't been as earthquake prone as other parts of the country, although earthquakes are a reasonable expectation wherever you go in NZ. The whole of NZ sits atop a plate boundary, which you can roughly trace up the Southern Alps in the South Island, through to the volcanoes in the North Island. This expresses as dozens of fault lines throughout the country. There is something like 9 significant or major faultlines alone around the area where I live. One of them caused an 8+ earthquake in 1855 that reshaped areas of the harbour and surrounds, and there is visible evidence of fault action all over the place if you know what you are looking at. My house sits on a ridge above a 15 mile or so line of bluffs that mark the main Wellington Fault that will sooner or later generate a very large earthquake here (the 1855 quake was from another nearby fault).

There is some good locally generated info on NZ's geology here http://www.geonet.org.nz/index.html. Whenever we feel a shake here my wife and I always go to this site and check out the details. For a slightly more technical and in depth report than what the news will give you, here is Geonet's precis of yesterdays earthquake: http://www.geonet.org.nz/news/article-sep-...earthquake.html

The 'most recent' earthquake page is unsurprisingly all centred around the Canterbury region as the aftershocks continue. There is a list of other significant NZ quakes with details here http://www.geonet.org.nz/earthquake/histor...akes/index.html

Edited September 5, 2010 by Mumbles

[4scourge7]

Very happy to hear there was no loss of life.

All the best for those in NZ

Cheers, Ian

[stevehnz]

I'm about 200 miles due north of Christchurch so we only got a bit of a shake up, nothing though to what happened in Christchurch, I'm still shocked & stunned by what has happened to a city I know so well & gutted for some folk we know who will have to demolish their home because of the damage, just one though of hundreds. I think what has been obvious to see is just the visible tip of the iceberg as it were. If you didn't take a look at mumbles second last link, its worth it to do so & especially click on the first link on that page. THIS ONE some stunning pics of what happens when the earth does a side step.

Steve.