History.
EARTHQUAKE!
Friday 22nd August, 2003
I had gone to bed early, needing a decent sleep. Dozing off was easy and soon absolute peace and quiet reigned. But God had other plans! Instead of rocking me gently to the land of nod, He grabbed the whole of the lower South Island and shook it so hard that I woke, finding myself falling off the bed and very disorientated!
As I became more alert I stopped wondering WHO was under the bed, rocking it and realised it was the biggest earthquake I had ever felt! When the bed finally stopped moving, I got out and ran around the house, checking that we hadn�t had a vehicle crash through the wall! There had been no sound, but I wanted to reassure myself that firstly there was no-one laying injured needing help and secondly, there was no risk of fire!
When I got back to the bedroom, the light was on, above the bed and I looked at the ceiling light, swinging happily in a huge arc, like a macabre pendulum! I booted up the computer to see if there were any reports about it on local news pages, but it was too soon. So I got offline and phoned Mum and Dad. As I was talking to them, an aftershock occurred and again, the light started swinging.
I had the radio on for the 1am news and heard that it was a 7.1, about 120 miles away, on the west coast! I felt a little reassured, given its distance from Dunedin, but that was no guarantee that there wouldn�t be more or that weaknesses in buildings might not mean they didn�t withstand the pressure of being rocked like a very badly made box!
As each minute passed, without further motion, and with a calming milky mug of Milo inside me, I settled to sleep once more. WRONG! At 2.20, aftershocks of 6.2 had us rocking and rolling again! Eventually I fell asleep, fitfully, waking soon after 6am and listening to the news. We all heard how miraculously, no-one had been injured, not even a cut finger! How houses had lost chimney stacks and buildings had cracked, but aside from broken china and ornaments, lost tiles and a few fallen trees, there was nothing worse!
Workers in Supermarkets, filling the shelves overnight and cleaning, spoke about how they had seen it all happen, as if in slow motion to start, with a few items toppling off the shelf and breaking. They all thought it was a colleague playing a prank, until the shelves began swaying like undulating snakes, rocking at angles of over 25 degrees to the perpendicular! Later on, the TV broadcast video shot by the stores security surveillance cameras, showing how the stock seemed to be doing the �lemming dance� and leaping to its demise, on the floor! It also showed the time scale, with employees rushing to brace themselves in all available doorways, as whole ranks of shopping trolleys went walkabout on their own!
Another programme showed an Infant School teacher helping her young pupils come to terms with what had happened. Their generation had never needed to know how to deal with such an event, so as part of the lesson she went through earthquake drill with them. It is, however, essential for every New Zealander to know where to go and why, in the event of another quake.
This one was of the same magnitude as the San Francisco quake of 1989, in which 69 people died and miles of freeway collapsed, leaving horrific images in peoples minds. I wont ever forget seeing the shots of cars, dangling 50 feet above other roads, the drivers trapped until they could be reached. That this quake occurred on the west coast and not in Wellington was indeed a miracle. Had the capital been struck, then the whole world would be watching rescue operations and sending aid to us.
Aftershocks of 5.1 and 6.3 were felt on Friday and early Saturday, lasting just a few seconds. The initial quake was found to have lasted almost THREE minutes, which is a very long time! Two days later there was another quake of 5.5. This time it was west of Te Anau and was felt in Dunedin. A helicopter flew over the site of the previous quakes and could see the injuries that the land had sustained. Trees had fallen into a huge gash in the cliff face and another swathe had been brought down by a localised tsunami which it was recorded had come in as 6 consecutive waves, each increasing in depth by up to 1.6 metres.
A group of primary school children were stranded for a day, unable to pass a landslip that had blocked the only exit road out from their campsite. Once the road was sufficiently cleared, they walked through, very bravely, to waiting transport and the trip home to central Otago. I am sure there were tearful reunions when the relief of being home hit them!
Aftershocks continue and will for several more days. One a little earlier today was registered as being 4.9 on the Richter scale and was felt in the tiny town of Te Anau. The experts say: �On average, New Zealand can expect an earthquake of magnitude 7 or greater about once a decade and a magnitude 8 once every century.�
So I hereby cancel further subscriptions to this service!
25th August 2003
Seismograph Drum