To Peter in particular, my sympathy and best wishes to you and all you know.
From Melbourne, indeed all in Oz, we were able to watch the whole sequence of events over that much-maligned medium, television.
Obviously the pictures concentrated on the centre of Christchurch so we never knew the amount of damage to the suburban area. Only now are details emerging.
On first viewing, what amazed me was that so many multi-storey buildings were still standing or appeared to be in reasonable shape when the helicopter films came through. Whether they will still be useable, after two major 'quakes, will require a lot of analysis.
As a civil engineer whose main interest was in code writing, it seems to me that modern [post-1960's] buildings have performed well; for earlier ones the forces were just too large. So very sad.
I have a Mac application named Earth Browser which reports all sorts of natural happenings. On 22 Feb 2011 there were two earthquakes of 4.9 and 5.1 in east of Caledonia, preceded by another of 6.1 south of the Fiji Islands and 5.1 near the Solomon Islands on 21 Feb. These four plus Christchurch are on or near the same plate boundary.
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Regards from brianF
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On 24/02/2011, at 8:07 AM, Peter Tuffley wrote:
On 23/02/2011, at 11:16 PM, Geoffrey Heard wrote:
Best wishes to everyone on the list who is around, near, or toched by the Christchurch earthquake. It's just plain awful.
Before and after pix from the NZ Herald:
http://tinyurl.com/4v93ev8Best, geoff
Thanks very much -- you have no idea how much it helps to know that there are people around the world who care.
Peter
Peter Tuffley
114 Birdwood Avenue
Christchurch 8023
New Zealand
Tel/fax (+64-3-) 332-7951
mobile 021-123-2134