jmh

Glad to hear everyone seems to be ok. Although all my family are Auckland it makes me feel emotional watching people in my home country experiencing this.

I remember as child growing up in NZ we had lessons and practice sessions on what to do in an earthquake (sit under the desk, stand in a door frame etc). That was a LONG time ago, so that advice might be out of date, but migrants should research the best advice today. NZ is on a fault line so earthquakes are a real risk. I wouldn't let it stop you going though. You could be hit by a London bus tomorrow!

Boopy

Your right..... still the same... under a desk or in a door way. I remember when we first moved here & heard the drill, hubby just laughed at me, cos I insisted on shipping our lovely new dining table over...... All glass!!!!

Pollyana

Definitely keep up to date with current advice - have an escape and evacuation plan, and an evacuation kit - so you can pick up the essentials of paperwork etc easily, and don't end up sitting in the car with a pillow case and a jar of gherkins!!

Good thread here - http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=633208 though I haven't checked to see if all the links still work.

alchris

Really glad to hear you are ok


My thoughts go out to others in the Christchurch/Canterbury area

Persephone

Thanks Chris! Going to bed soon, been a long day

I know what to do, was just too sleepy at 4.30 to get out of bed, my survival instinct is obviously not that developed I do like my bed... Mr S is not working tonight so I'm sure he'll kick me out of bed if it happens again!

Persephone

Thanks for that hadn't managed to find it anywhere. That's originally what I thought but couldn't be sure. 20secs is a very long time when you are shaking, rattling and rolling!

Pollyana

I can imagine. Not something I would want to experience. The eeriest thing from this end was sitting here seeing the quake notifications roll in on twitter, and knwoing that there is nothing you can do. You just have to sit and wait till things calm down before you will get any reports of damamge, injury etc and that bit sitting with your heart in your mouth is pretty bad. I was chatting on BE when I got all the alerts, and my first thought - quite honestly - was OMG we have so many posters over there, how are they......

pricklykina

Thinking of you Cantabrians. Hope you're able to get some sleep. You must all be pretty knackered. Stay safe

expatasia

You get used to them, easy for me to say since I live and work in very new earthquake proof buildings. Just hope I'm not in the Tokyo Metro when the Big One hits. Odds are in my favour.


Good to read ppl in NZ seem to be ok.

LyndaW

Just to add my few words to all of you who have been affected by the 'quake & to hope that you are all OK. Looks pretty awful on BBC TV & with more bad weather forecast I hope that no more severe damage will happen. I have read through all the posts so far & everyone who has posted seems to have escaped with just minor breakages, thank goodness.

Chins up, everyone, take care,

Lynda in France

Perry Groves

I am coming to Wellington next week. Hope no quakes then

RobDon

Lots of Love & Best Wishes To All Those Affected.

DennisBergkamp

Amazing no one is dead
thank whoever/whatever you believe in!

Hope the Aussies chip in with some assistance if needed

Surely the UK should help as well financially

saoghalbeag

We live in the CBD - right near Victoria St where loads of buildings crumbled into street, including (as we discovered whilst stumbling a bit dazed in search of coffee) Our Daily Bagel - got to it and the entire row of shops have lost the top storey facade. AND they couldn't steam the milk when we did find coffee...

But extremely thankful that this was the main inconvenience - we got a terrifying rumble at 435 (took pics of the tower junction clock stuck on 435 - all the clocks in town the same). Thought it was a storm battering us, then realised it was possibly going to bring the house down (live in a ground floor flat in old Kiwi villa so storey above us).

Grabbed my daughter (who would NOT wake up) and STILL no idea we were in a quake. Not until I tried to stand and was thrown against the dresser that I clued on to the rhthmic sort of sliding movement - like the house was sliding back and forth on it's foundations - that I really panicked. It was like being in the dodgems or on a ride - and this endless bang, bang, bang and woosh, woosh, woosh. And then the creaking sounds of the weatherboard...

We did not lose power or water or mobile phone or net and for that I am very, very grateful!!! In the dark (not wanting to turn on lights as aftershocks kept rolling in and had this idea that I'd start a fire), couldn't hear noise from the other flats the first thing I did was turn on the laptop!! And all that came up from google were bloody twitter messages!!!!

Was very frustrating not to be able to get info. The web had nothing at that point (Besides useless tweets and we've just moved in so no TV yet. Plus, who the hell has a radio except for my grandma???? I'll be getting one as the online radio streaming wouldn't work - heard other reports of it being unreliable. A lot of Christchurch sites wouldn't load either.

Found these sites useful (for next time...NO THANK YOU!

ECan

Get Thru

Civil Defence

slept last night under table in office with car packed and unlocked ready to go after a friend phoned to say Civil Defence had advised us to evacuate to Addington Raceway!! Neighbours weren't moving and promised to come get us and drive to their family in Ashburton if it got bad so stayed put. Finally got some sleep after midnight but very jumpy after the larger afterschock of the afternoon/evening (reports saying it was around 530pm but we were in supermarket at that point and felt nothing then got a big jolt about an hour or so later)

Never ever want to experience it again and think that was part of the shock - I knew there were quakes in NZ but had looked into it and ChCh is not known for big ones! Even spent ages studying the display at the museum 2 weeks ago.

saoghalbeag

Went for a wander round the cbd at around 7am after it happened and thing that most stood out were the ducks - there were half a dozen perched on top of the language school building near punting on the Avon on Worcester St making a huge racket.

Interestingly their wee ducklings were still on the ground!!! Talk about every man (or duck) for themselves!!

Apparently (via twitter) there were reports of animals/pets waking people around an hour before it happened.

Hope everyone's getting their power back on today. We're still boiling water - tried to buy but the shop had no eftpos. Might take a wee wander up later. Great comraderie around early morning yesterday but was interesting to see it wear off by around 9 or 10 as so many cars and ppl started clogging the cbd. Can't imagine how the tourists are feeling - we came over for a quick hol exactly this time last year and would've been scared witless...as we pretty much are now and with no plane waiting to take us elsewhere...