7.0 earthquake hits Christchurch, New Zealand

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A 7.0 earthquake struck Christchurch, New Zealand, causing significant infrastructure damage but, remarkably, no fatalities. The quake led to major disruptions, including compromised municipal water systems and reports of minor looting. Residents experienced continuous aftershocks, with many expressing relief that their homes remained intact despite the severity of the event. The city had been preparing for such disasters, which likely mitigated the impact. Overall, the community's response has been disciplined, and the civil defense measures proved effective in managing the crisis.
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Interesting. A natural disaster is instantly a political issue... or we're in the wrong forum.
 
Eh, it could qualify as a world affair, but I'm not sure what kind of debate there could be unless we have some Westboro Baptist type people on the forum
 
Office_Shredder said:
Eh, it could qualify as a world affair, but I'm not sure what kind of debate there could be unless we have some Westboro Baptist type people on the forum

God hates penguins?
 
Office_Shredder said:
... unless we have some Westboro Baptist type people on the forum
No one died ... so they (the WBs) won't bother showing up.
 
drankin said:
Interesting. A natural disaster is instantly a political issue... or we're in the wrong forum.

I am opposed to large earthquakes. Just the thought makes me shudder.
 
drankin said:
Interesting. A natural disaster is instantly a political issue... or we're in the wrong forum.
It would qualify as a world affair (WA in P&WA), not a political issue.
 
Astronuc said:
It would qualify as a world affair (WA in P&WA), not a political issue.

I see. I was expecting some dialog to go with the OP. Some point of discussion anyway.
 
drankin said:
I see. I was expecting some dialog to go with the OP. Some point of discussion anyway.

OK, I'll give it a try..


So, who felt it? :smile:
 
  • #10
drankin said:
I see. I was expecting some dialog to go with the OP. Some point of discussion anyway.

I thought that's what we were doing. I, too, am anti-quake.
 
  • #11
Math Is Hard said:
OK, I'll give it a try..


So, who felt it? :smile:

We have to have at least a few Kiwis here!
 
  • #12
There was major infrastructure damage in Christchurch the closest city to the quake.

Mayor: Quake hit city 'like an iceberg'

Apparently there was a fair amount of looting going on.

The municipal water system has been compromised. Many people will be without drinking water or water for bathing.
 
  • #13
Yes, I was knocked out of my bed this morning. Really quite hard to believe the house is standing, let alone there is no damage visible, just one mirror knocked off the wall.

One cat still unaccounted for - a nervous cat at the best of times, so could have ended up anywhere.

The creepy thing is all the aftershocks, every 10 minutes, most of them in their selves in the 5s and worse than any other earthquake I've experienced.

Quake appears to happened in an unsuspected fault nearer to town and is not the "big one" of the trans-alpine fault which we have all been waiting for.

Quite fun now that the power is back on to watch the TV news of town (where we are not allowed in) and seeing the rubble that appears to have been the studio where my daughter does art (a few paintings are probably in the wreckage) and other very familiar landmarks.

In world disaster terms, this of course rates as a stubbed toe. Just $$$ for buildings and roads, but locally there will be cleaning up and disruption for weeks.

If you want a political dimension, it is the mayoral elections here next month and the incumbent was on the ropes. A good crisis might save him yet!
 
  • #14
apeiron said:
Yes, I was knocked out of my bed this morning. Really quite hard to believe the house is standing, let alone there is no damage visible, just one mirror knocked off the wall.

One cat still unaccounted for - a nervous cat at the best of times, so could have ended up anywhere.

The creepy thing is all the aftershocks, every 10 minutes, most of them in their selves in the 5s and worse than any other earthquake I've experienced.

Quake appears to happened in an unsuspected fault nearer to town and is not the "big one" of the trans-alpine fault which we have all been waiting for.

Quite fun now that the power is back on to watch the TV news of town (where we are not allowed in) and seeing the rubble that appears to have been the studio where my daughter does art (a few paintings are probably in the wreckage) and other very familiar landmarks.

In world disaster terms, this of course rates as a stubbed toe. Just $$$ for buildings and roads, but locally there will be cleaning up and disruption for weeks.

If you want a political dimension, it is the mayoral elections here next month and the incumbent was on the ropes. A good crisis might save him yet!

Wow, so glad to hear you're OK, apeiron! I'm curious, is your house made of wood? That's what most buildings are made of here in the quake-prone Seattle area. It's soooo flexible in an earthquake, yet remains structurally sound.

And no deaths that I've heard, that's really fantastic. A moment of grateful silence for Civil Engineers :approve:.
 
  • #15
lisab said:
Wow, so glad to hear you're OK, apeiron! I'm curious, is your house made of wood? That's what most buildings are made of here in the quake-prone Seattle area. It's soooo flexible in an earthquake, yet remains structurally sound.

And no deaths that I've heard, that's really fantastic. A moment of grateful silence for Civil Engineers :approve:.

My house is concrete mostly - particularly strong by local standards, though you are right that there is a lot of wood housing here which just sways happily.

The damage is all in central town where there is a lot of old (100 year old is old here) brick offices and stores. And in the east side of the suburbs where it is all built on sandy soils that liquify.
 
  • #16
Impressive that nobody seems to have died in such a destructive event. looting and the rest is unfortunate, but no deaths is fantastic. Glad you're well (and still connected to the net) Apeiron!

Given NZ, it's really too bad that this occurred in the second most populated city in the country. :frown:
 
  • #17
nismaratwork said:
Impressive that nobody seems to have died in such a destructive event. looting and the rest is unfortunate, but no deaths is fantastic. Glad you're well (and still connected to the net) Apeiron!

Given NZ, it's really too bad that this occurred in the second most populated city in the country. :frown:

Looting? That was about two people pulling some stuff out of a broken shop window. In fact the response here has been remarkably disciplined. The general feeling so far is that it is surprising how level-headed the public have been. When people were told not to come into the inner city and rubberneck, they did as advised.

This was an earthquake to match Haiti's. But seismologists are reminding us rather too gleefully that it was only a 7, not the 8 which we should get every 300 years, and which we haven't had for 300 years.

No part of NZ is safe. The whole place is a faultline between two plates. Our biggest lake was one of the world's most recent super-volcanoes. Christchurch, like any town with a deep harbour, is formed around a not too old crater rim.

Because of this, the town is quite well prepared for an earthquake disaster. Over the past few years, there has even been quite a bit of building strengthening going on as a result of new bylaws - and those who had been dragging their feet will now probably be collecting on their national earthquake insurance.

Our national museum has an earthquake simulation "ride" where you get bumped about by a quake modeled on a Japanese event. This itself turned out to be useful preparation. It really did feel like that, if a little more wild.

Anyway, the civil defence response has proved pretty effective so far. The bill is going to be huge, but the preparation has paid.

The tremors are still continuing. It is a little like being on a ship, getting little bumps all the time.
 
  • #18
The concrete construcyion is interesting. My ex-fiance lived in Sicily, where they get many earthquakes and all housing must be concrete, apparently enginered to withstand earthquakes?
 
  • #19
apeiron said:
Looting? That was about two people pulling some stuff out of a broken shop window. In fact the response here has been remarkably disciplined. The general feeling so far is that it is surprising how level-headed the public have been. When people were told not to come into the inner city and rubberneck, they did as advised.

This was an earthquake to match Haiti's. But seismologists are reminding us rather too gleefully that it was only a 7, not the 8 which we should get every 300 years, and which we haven't had for 300 years.

No part of NZ is safe. The whole place is a faultline between two plates. Our biggest lake was one of the world's most recent super-volcanoes. Christchurch, like any town with a deep harbour, is formed around a not too old crater rim.

Because of this, the town is quite well prepared for an earthquake disaster. Over the past few years, there has even been quite a bit of building strengthening going on as a result of new bylaws - and those who had been dragging their feet will now probably be collecting on their national earthquake insurance.

Our national museum has an earthquake simulation "ride" where you get bumped about by a quake modeled on a Japanese event. This itself turned out to be useful preparation. It really did feel like that, if a little more wild.

Anyway, the civil defence response has proved pretty effective so far. The bill is going to be huge, but the preparation has paid.

The tremors are still continuing. It is a little like being on a ship, getting little bumps all the time.

Heh, two people pulling stuff out of a window. :biggrin: I like that image. Yeah, it goes to show that decent construction, social order, and general preparedness goes a LOOOOONG way. You should give some feedback to the company that makes that simulator and tell them they have a pretty good lock on the experience; it isn't everyone who rides out a 7.0.

I have to say, you analogy of the ship is incredibly apt when you consider the nature of plate tectonics, you know? Anyway, you're well, nobody died, and property can be rebuilt... and who knows, it may be that energy releases such as this go a long way towards alleviating an "8.0" event. There is a similar theory about the "BIG ONE" in California, that sometimes there is a single massive release, and in other times it's a series of smaller (7.0's and such) quakes. Here's to hoping!
 
  • #20
Evo said:
The concrete construcyion is interesting. My ex-fiance lived in Sicily, where they get many earthquakes and all housing must be concrete, apparently enginered to withstand earthquakes?

You can do amazing things with concrete to make it highly elastic, and even self-sealing to an extent. It worked for the Romans, and it's still going strong!

http://math.nist.gov/mcsd/savg/parallel/epc/index.html

http://ezinearticles.com/?Elastic-Composite,-Reinforced-Lightweight-Concrete-(ECRLC)---A-Brief&id=4543098
 
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  • #21
Sorry to hear of this but glad there are no fatalities. We had just been considering Christchurch in the 'Where's this landmark?' thread.

There seems to have been quite good preparation which is important. I dread to think of the impact on certain countries where a lot of building has been quite wild and not often according to any standards for decades.

apeiron said:
One cat still unaccounted for - a nervous cat at the best of times, so could have ended up anywhere.

I hope it will return. Can you say when it was last seen and whether it was specially nervous before the event?
 
  • #22
epenguin said:
I hope it will return. Can you say when it was last seen and whether it was specially nervous before the event?

The cat came back in the evening. A lot of friend's cats also went awol and are straggling back.

No evidence of any prior nerves in the cats. Though it happened at 4.30 am, so I wasn't around to be a witness to that anyway.
 
  • #23
apeiron said:
The cat came back in the evening. A lot of friend's cats also went awol and are straggling back.

No evidence of any prior nerves in the cats. Though it happened at 4.30 am, so I wasn't around to be a witness to that anyway.

Oh, I was just about to ask about your kitty! I'm happy to hear the good news.:smile:

Our big Northridge quake (1994) was an early morning one, like yours. I think it was around 4:30 AM if I recall correctly. It sounded and felt like an invisible freight train was coming through the house.
 
  • #24
To echo others here, sorry to hear of this, but good to hear of no fatalities and of the remarkable public discipline.
 
  • #25
Oh, you have a cat; glad to hear it's well and returned home! I would be worried sick in a similar situation until my pet was safe and sound.
 
  • #26
lisab said:
We have to have at least a few Kiwis here!

I live in Wellington (some 300km north of Christchurch) and we felt it. Was very powerful even from that far away!
 
  • #27
I'm impressed by both the civility and the complete lack of deaths! I've lived through three big Earthquakes, including the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake that struck San Francisco. That was only a 6.9, and they're calling the Christchurch quake a 7.1.

I was in Sacramento at the time, walking on the sidewalk. Then I was walking in the grass. When I corrected back to the sidewalk, I found myself in the street! I didn't realize it was an earthquake until I got home about 50 seconds later and flipped on the World Series. It hadn't made the news just yet, but it soon did.
 
  • #28
For those interested -

New Zealand 2010 Earthquake Assessment Diary
http://www.asce.org/PPLContent.aspx?id=12884902109

SEI - http://content.seinstitute.org/
 
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  • #29
apeiron said:
This was an earthquake to match Haiti's. But seismologists are reminding us rather too gleefully that it was only a 7, not the 8 which we should get every 300 years, and which we haven't had for 300 years.

Gambler's fallacy much?
 
  • #30
CRGreathouse said:
Gambler's fallacy much?

Probably not given that two continental plates are grinding past each other at a steady rate, accumulating strain. The main fault HAS to go every now and then.

Talking to the expert on the subject of the Alpine fault, he happens to have new unpublished data that pushes out the return to 500-600 years. So a bit of good news is that we won't be "overdue" for perhaps another couple of hundred years.
 
  • #31
Another earthquake has hit Christchurch, 6.3, 5km deep.

www.nzherald.co.nz

www.stuff.co.nz

for updates. 65 confirmed dead so far. Absolutely shocking. I actually went to ChCh in October last year (my dad and I had originally purchased tickets in March for about $17 one way from Wellington - special deal was going on) and the place I stayed at, reports bodies have been removed from there.
 
  • #32
Thanks, Stevie

http://www.geonet.org.nz/earthquake/quakes/3468575g-maps.html
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsww/Quakes/usb0001igm.php#details

Shallow earthquakes followed by a swarm of shallow aftershocks means a lot of damage.

I'm waiting to hear from relatives there. It may be a while. :frown:
 
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  • #33
Apeiron, glad you are well. The death rate is quite significant - officially at 65, but realistically expected to be in the hundreds. Which is understandable, given that whole buildings collapsed on top of people, in a city. Very sad - no cause for frivolity here.

Our government (Australia) was quick with the aid - flying over about 100 search and rescue people within hours of the event, and extending offers of anything else that's needed.
 
  • #34
Looting ? Just to add, we've been watching it for most of the day, and there hasn't been one report of looting. In fact, quite the opposite - folk were orderly and well disciplined. The emergency services have been marvelous, often dragging people out of collapsed building even as those buildings continued to deteriorate during aftershocks.

quote edit
 
  • #35
alt said:
Apeiron, glad you are well. The death rate is quite significant - officially at 65, but realistically expected to be in the hundreds. Which is understandable, given that whole buildings collapsed on top of people, in a city. Very sad - no cause for frivolity here.

Our government (Australia) was quick with the aid - flying over about 100 search and rescue people within hours of the event, and extending offers of anything else that's needed.

Actually I don't think apeiron has checked in yet. The post you read was from the last quake.

I really hope he's OK!
 
  • #36
lisab said:
Actually I don't think apeiron has checked in yet. The post you read was from the last quake.

I really hope he's OK!

OOPS ! Thanks. Should have looked a the dates.

I hope so too. Being so close, we get much reporting, and the situation / death toll is looking worse.

Last quake was at 4.30 AM - no one in city. This one, ealry afternoon - everyone is city.
 
  • #37
StevieTNZ said:
Another earthquake has hit Christchurch, 6.3, 5km deep.

www.nzherald.co.nz

www.stuff.co.nz

for updates. 65 confirmed dead so far. Absolutely shocking. I actually went to ChCh in October last year (my dad and I had originally purchased tickets in March for about $17 one way from Wellington - special deal was going on) and the place I stayed at, reports bodies have been removed from there.

I'm so sorry.

Baruch Dayan Emet.

--


Apeiron... Fuzzy... ROLL CALL!

When I'm worried, it usually means other people are EXTREMELY worried.

Damn it... BE OK you two, and anyone else there.
 
  • #38
nismaratwork said:
I'm so sorry.

Baruch Dayan Emet.

--


Apeiron... Fuzzy... ROLL CALL!

When I'm worried, it usually means other people are EXTREMELY worried.

Damn it... BE OK you two, and anyone else there.

Sorry, I didn't see this sooner. I'm not in NZ, but thanks nismar. I'm very sorry to hear about this and hope aperion is ok, too.
 
  • #40
fuzzyfelt said:
Sorry, I didn't see this sooner. I'm not in NZ, but thanks nismar. I'm very sorry to hear about this and hope aperion is ok, too.

Ahhh... good good.


@Turbo-1: Oh hell...
 
  • #41
It is pretty bad down there. The death has been revised down to 32, but that is surely going to increase.

http://nz.news.yahoo.com/a/-/top-stories/8887668/woman-dies-with-baby-in-arms/ - just makes my heart sink.
 
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  • #42
StevieTNZ said:
It is pretty bad down there. The death has been revised down to 32, but that is surely going to increase.

http://nz.news.yahoo.com/a/-/top-stories/8887668/woman-dies-with-baby-in-arms/ - just makes my heart sink.

Damn it... where is apeiron...
 
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  • #43
This is very worrying, at this point we need to assume power is out and apeiron can not contact us. This event is really very sad.
 
  • #44
hypatia said:
This is very worrying, at this point we need to assume power is out and apeiron can not contact us. This event is really very sad.

Agreed... seeing this though... oh lord. I really hope that he's OK, but I also hope he hasn't lost friends/family.


The more information that comes out the more it seems CC is devestated.

NZ PM: "This is our darkest day"

Here's to hoping he's too busy helping people to make contact...
 
  • #45
What a stressful day.Our eldest son,his Kiwi partner and our two grandchildren live in Woolston,Christchurch.Our son emigrated from here (London) a few years back.Power was out in Woolston and it was hours before anyone could make contact.Eventually our son was able to give us a call.Thankfully the family is fine.Our hearts go to all the families who are affected.
 
  • #46
Dadface said:
What a stressful day.Our eldest son,his Kiwi partner and our two grandchildren live in Woolston,Christchurch.Our son emigrated from here (London) a few years back.Power was out in Woolston and it was hours before anyone could make contact.Eventually our son was able to give us a call.Thankfully the family is fine.Our hearts go to all the families who are affected.
Wonderful to hear they are safe.
 
  • #47
Dadface said:
What a stressful day.Our eldest son,his Kiwi partner and our two grandchildren live in Woolston,Christchurch.Our son emigrated from here (London) a few years back.Power was out in Woolston and it was hours before anyone could make contact.Eventually our son was able to give us a call.Thankfully the family is fine.Our hearts go to all the families who are affected.

Whew, that's great news!
 
  • #48
Dadface said:
What a stressful day.Our eldest son,his Kiwi partner and our two grandchildren live in Woolston,Christchurch.Our son emigrated from here (London) a few years back.Power was out in Woolston and it was hours before anyone could make contact.Eventually our son was able to give us a call.Thankfully the family is fine.Our hearts go to all the families who are affected.

GOOD... I'm very glad.


Now... apeiron... stop worrying us.
 
  • #49
Astronuc said:
There was major infrastructure damage in Christchurch the closest city to the quake.

Mayor: Quake hit city 'like an iceberg'

Apparently there was a fair amount of looting going on.

The municipal water system has been compromised. Many people will be without drinking water or water for bathing.

I tried to contact a client this afternoon on the outskirts of the city (it was pre-scheduled) and couldn't complete the call. I also sent an email with no response.
 
  • #50
I'm still waiting to hear from folks there. :frown:

The damage this time was much worse than the mag 7 last year.
Saturday, September 04, 2010 at 04:35:46 AM at epicenter
45 km (30 miles) W of Christchurch, New Zealand


The current one hit Tuesday, February 22, 2011 at 12:51:43 PM at epicenter
NEAR Christchurch, New Zealand (just 6 mi (10 km) SE of city) toward Lyttelton

Shaking intensity in the city was much greater for this earthquake than the magnitude 7.1 earthquake for any of its other aftershocks. The highest shaking was recorded at Pages Road Pumping Station at 188 %g, with readings of 127 %g at Heathcote Valley Primary School and 107 %g at Hulverstone Road Pumping Station. This is due to the proximity of the epicentre to the city and the shallow depth.
1g of acceleration is considered very significant. Pages Road Pumping Station was near 2g!

Figure shows the ground acceleration. The red squares mean the most severe damage to structures.
http://www.geonet.org.nz/var/storage/images/media/images/news/2011/lyttelton_pga/57159-1-eng-GB/lyttelton_pga.png

Ref: http://www.geonet.org.nz/news/feb-2011-christchurch-badly-damaged-by-magnitude-6-3-earthquake.html (page is periodically updated)
The acceleration at Heathcote Valley Primary School has been revised to 2.20 g!
 
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