Imz

HI FOLKS,

HOPE ALL IS WELL.

WHAT'S THE CHANCES OF AN EARTHQUAKE HAPPENING IN PLACES LIKE WELLINGTON. I UNDERSTAND THEY HAVE A HUGE FAULT-LINE RUNNING THROUGH THE ENTIRE REGION. THIS IS ONE THINGS THAT PUTS ME OFF MOVING THERE OR ANYWHERE ELSE WHERE THERES LIKELY TO BE AN EARTHQUAKE IN NZ. I UNDERSTAND THEY ARE WAITING FOR THE "BIG ONE" ARE THEY PREPARED, IF OR WHEN IT HAPPENDS , COULD LOADS OF PEOPLE DIE.

THANKS FOLKS

concretepump

whats the chances of getting run over by a bus, think your worrying over nothing

Imz

is it that rare for a earthquake to happen in Wellington? I was wondering why theres 5 million dollar houses in the hills , if the big one did hit , those houses would be the first to go.

The fault line even runs through the city centre and highway 1!

gags

I take it that recent events have made you think this way, and rightly so but would this put you off the chance to move to Wellington or any part of nz?

Imz

Hi Gags,

Your right. People say wellington are due the "Big one" and i understand there are 50 active fault lines in Wellington. Thats kinda thought is scary! Anyone live in Welly ? Who actually worries about this?

kamburu pat

Nobody from Wellington has so far replied to your question, my son lives in Wellington and they occur frequently, they are not necessarily damage causing quakes. Check out: geonet.org.nz for more information. I was there for four months last winter at this time and didn`t experience one, apparently I was lucky!
Pat.

Imz

Hi Kambura ,

I can't wait from Welly people to reply- Am i over thinking the earthquake risk?

What does your son do over there by the way and does he enjoy it/?

Mgee

Hi,

some objective information from Greater Wellington pages:
http://www.gw.govt.nz/hazard-management/.

In the fact sheets you can see which areas are likely to be affected the most in case of a big earthquake or other natural hazards. In the Wellington earthquake hazard sheet you can also find instructions for the emergency kit that every household should have.

There's no need to panic, but it's good to prepare your household so that if, for example, a water line is burst due to a quake or electricity's gone for a couple of days. Storing emergency water is THE most important thing, because in a quake the normal sources of water (city water systems, wells etc) may become contaminated due to cracks and breakages caused by the movement of the soil. It may take several days before water and power are restored even to the least affected areas, depending on the damage on the infrastructure, so store at least 3 days' supply of water and food.

Haiti suffered so badly because the local infrastructure was poor to start with, and due to the poverty of the country, the building materials were mostly of poor quality (bad quality concrete, no earthquake proofing techniques used). A good thing in the oh-so-much hated wooden houses is that they tolerate shaking a lot better than brick/stone/concrete buildings. The level of preparedness in Wellington and in NZ in general is far better than in poorer countries.

I'd say taking reasonable precautions is good and maybe choosing one of the lower risk areas to live in is wise, but there's no need to panic. In the end the earthquakes are incredibly hard to predict and it's all down to luck. Do what you can, i.e. get emergency supplies and continue living your life. Who knows, it may never happen!

Mgee

PS: In case you're wondering about my interest in these things: I'm a search and rescue volunteer looking forward to joining the local organizations (USaR, LandSaR) when we move to Welly, and during our recce we already met a couple of local volunteers. We also have two SaR dogs (rubble, tracking and area search trained) moving with us. My friend is at the moment in Haiti, working as a surgeon in one of the Red Cross field hospitals (his 5th Red Cross emergency field assignment).

RobClubley

We've felt several since being here. The biggest was about a 4.6 I think which was a rumbling, house shaking, stuff in cupboards rattling for 30 seconds or so.

They're kinda cool in a scary sort of way!

All the buildings are as earthquake safe as they can be. I work on level 15 of an 18 storey tower on The Terrace - all of Wellington's tallest buildings are right on the fault line, my work included.

It's not something people worry about! Wellington has a glass and mirror shop 100m from the sign that reads "Fault mine here!"

From what they say we might be due a big one next week or in 200 years. No-one knows. But lots of small ones are good, they reduce the pressure.

New Zealand is on the Ring of Fire and is formed from two tectonic plates pushing against eachother. It grows by about 10mm a year if I recall correctly.
This means active volcanoes and eathquakes. Also (up North a bit) geysers, hot springs, steam rising from the roadside, boiling mud pools etc.

But as they say here "She'll be right" "No worries"

Wooly_Cow

I think you’ve already been sent the link to the hazard risk site and this in turn links to maps of Wellington and surrounding area showing where the risk are the greatest.

To ignore or down play the obvious risks of living in an earthquake zone such as many parts of New Zealand would not be right and one should be prepared.

However you should also put the risk in proportion. Wellington council estimate about 340 deaths in the event of a 7.4 magnitude shallow quake in or around Wellington. The periodicity of these sorts of quake in this region (and there are several major fault lines) is around 350-500 years (though it depends on the fault line). If you assume a population of 400,000 the risk of death through an earthquake is about 1 in 600,000 per year.

Compare this with the risk of death through motor vehicle accident, which stands at 1 in 10,000 (NZ figures for 2007).

You are therefore 60 times more likely to be killed by a car or bus than by an earthquake.

Of course just like you can reduce your chances of being killed or injured in a car accident so you can reduce your chances of being hurt or killed in a natural event.

As for recent quakes you can get good information on www.geonet.co.nz.

There was a large quake (7.8 on the Richter scale) in Dusky Sound, Firodland last September that was felt through New Zealand.

http://www.geonet.org.nz/earthquake/.../quake-12.html

This was larger than the Haiti earthquake but did virtually no damage and hurt no-one. This was because of the remoteness of the epicentre.

However a recent article (and sorry can’t find the link) suggested that Wellington had ‘dodged a bullet’ and that this indeed had relieved the pressure on the fault and was our once in 150-500 year quake. My understanding is that seismology is not so exact to determine that one quake will either increase or decrease the chances of another, but it is nice to think we did indeed already have the ‘big one’

crap coffee

hmm.... I keep forgetting about earthquakes. We're DOOMED!!!!

I have to say - anyone who prepares is very sensible. I'm unprepared. think I've got a bottle of water at home under the bench - and tinned food in the cupboard, and maybe a torch in the kitchen - but that's all.

I figure though - chances are the earthquake will hit while I'm at work in my 10th storey office .. (Reserve Bank of NZ building..one of the oldest and ugliest ever...on The Terrace) - and I'll be dead and not have to worry about suriving anyway... I've been working there since 2006, but rarely felt the tremor tho while at work.

We .. who working in an offce in Welly.. gotta be prepared - you could die at any time... when massive earthquake hit.

Horrible to think about, but true.

and if you don't want that....then LEAVE WELLY!!! - It's as simple as that.

Imagine if you were walking on Lambton Quay or the TCe - you'd get cut to pieces by all the glass falling on you. Then squashed by me falling out of the window on top of you............

I've got no way of cooking the tinned foood! and the water bottle will get squashed and explode. It's hopeless!!!

but I do not want to think about it. and do not want to worry. What's the point.

Imz

CRAP COFFEE , DO PEOPLE WHERE YOU WORK ACTUALLY TALK ABOUT THE BIG ONE? MY WORD THE WAY YOU DESCRIBE IT IS SCARY WAY SCARY!

RobClubley

My wife worked at the Commerce Commission on the Terrace. In her induction they told her if a big one hits the terrace will be metres deep in glass from the tower blocks and they would be stranded in the buildings for several days !

There are earthquake cabinets on all floors of buildings containing tinned foods, water, prybars, radios, bodybags etc!

Don't worry about it!

Wooly_Cow

Another interesting stat.

The risk of being killed by an Earthquake in Wellington is the same as being killed in an aircraft accident if you take 4-5 single air journeys per year.

.....so if you think that living here is dangerous.....it's almost as dangerous getting here (assuming each leg of the journey counts as one air journey there would be three getting here)

Genesis

The big one in Wellington has been down graded for now for some reason. But its when rather than if. If earthquakes really do bother you its a good idea to avoid NZ..maybe look at Oz. For me I would rather take my risks with natural forces than some of the crap that I had to contend with in Northampton. Each to their own aye? Personally I am waaay more concerned about the crap driving in NZ than anything else.