Christchurch Earthquake
Many of you will have heard that there has been a major, 7.1 earthquake in my home city of Christchurch, with a civil defence emergency declared and major infrastructural damage, but no loss of life—so friends and family all well, which is simply the best news.
In terms of my home, there has been some damage. The house is 90 years old and the brick chimney came down, doing some damage to the roof. But a friend and a neighbour, working with a local builder have secured it already. Otherwise the only damage internally appears to be from things fallen over and broken ornaments and some china—and again two friends went in today and tidied up the worst of that damage, which makes me feel both very humble and very grateful at the same time.
I am sure that it is still going to be a lot to go home to, but there is little more that can be done at this stage until I do get home Tuesday night.
Overall, it could have been so much worse and again I am just grateful that there has been no loss of life and family, friends and neighbours are all safe.
I’m glad to hear there were no people killed or badly injured, but sorry to hear about the damage. I hope it won’t be too costly to get everything fixed.
Sullivan—thank you for your thoughts. I hope so, too, re the cost, but will just have to see …
Glad to hear your house isn’t too badly damaged. Not very nice to come home to. We are still getting aftershocks. It’s a little bit unnerving, even though we have no damage to our house and the water and power are on. We are being asked to boil water, there are no buses, and we can’t go into the city.
Helen,
So glad to hear no major damage to your house. We are all well, though the firewall of the house cracked and is pulling one of our exterior walls a bit, so we have a large crack letting in some sunlight. Still very livable, though will have to be looked at and shored up, I am sure.
Hope this isn’t distracting your enjoyment of the Con.
Oh, and for obvious reasons, we didn’t have the ChCh specfic long lunch on Saturday:)
I hope it isn’t too horrible when you get back – what a fright! Amazing nobody was killed really.
Thank you everyone for your thoughts and support—I really appreciate it.
I’m glad to hear everything and everyone is OK – chimneys are a menace, aren’t they!
Given the number that have come down, I suspect this is going to do great things for Christchurch as a clean air zone!