Category: Earthquakes
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Hair cut just outside the red zone
Originally posted on rachel.blog:
We ventured into South City yesterday so that I could have a hair cut. South City is in the CBD just outside the cordoned off area, otherwise known as the red zone. I’ve never seen this part of town so quiet. My hair-dresser has been busy she says but one… -
Snowdrops in my garden and the Christchurch earthquake
The days are getting noticeably longer again. It seems to change very quickly from light to dark as winter sets in and then from dark to light again as winter draws to a close. Last November, the days grew shorter surprisingly quickly. You could see the difference from one day to the next. Now, in […]
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Winchester “hit” by earthquake
I wonder whether Vinny reads my blog? Vinny, if you’re reading this, I’m about to mock the Guardian for an article they’ve published. Feel free to wade in 🙂 An article in the Guardian today has the headline, Winchester hit by earthquake of 2.9 magnitude. My heart goes out to the people of Hampshire. It […]
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Up in flames
This is my first post on my new blog. I started writing a blog because I didn’t know how else to deal with my anxiety after the Christchurch earthquakes. Writing about my fears helped me immensely. It was an awful time. I couldn’t sleep at night and I was always on edge, waiting for that […]
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More earthquakes for the shaky isles
New Zealand is living up to its namesake – the shaky isles – with a string of earthquakes over the past few days. The biggest was a magnitude 6.5 this afternoon in Cook Strait, the channel of water between the North and South Islands. The location of the earthquake was 17km deep and about 50km […]
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Photos from Christchurch
Ben went to Christchurch for a few days this week and spent some time cycling around and taking photos. This is what he saw.
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Dental anxiety
I went to the dentist this morning. All was fine as it pretty much always is. But that doesn’t stop me from freaking out. What is it about the dentist that does this? I blame the school dental nurses of my childhood with their set of torture tools and creepy schadenfreude. The thing I hate […]
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OMG, EARTHQUAKE!
I was enjoying a very happy lunch with a friend of ours today when two pesky earthquakes came along and spoilt it. These are the first earthquakes I’ve felt since leaving Christchurch. They were little – Mag. 3.1 followed by a Mag. 3.9. I felt both. No-one else in our house felt the first and […]
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Could New Zealand get a Magnitude 9 earthquake?
I recently listened to an interview on Radio NZ with Chris Goldfinger, professor from Oregon State University, on super-earthquakes. You can listen to it online, but here is the gist of the discussion. Historically, geologists have thought that mega-earthquakes (Mag. 9), like the ones that occurred in Japan in 2011 and Sumatra in 2004, were thought […]
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How does Christchurch look today?
Christchurch counted its 11,000th earthquake since September 4th, 2010, today. It has been more than two years since the first Christchurch earthquake of September 4th, 2010. It is almost two years since the smaller, but more devastating aftershock, of February 22nd, 2011 that claimed 185 lives. To most of the rest of New Zealand and the […]
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Blondes have more fun
I’ve been really happy of late. Ben says, not to worry, I’ll get over it. The strange thing is, I don’t really know why I’m feeling so happy. My relationship with Auckland is still much the same. The only thing I can think of is that my outlook changed about the same time as bleaching […]
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Earthquake strengthening, Tourette's and Team Work
I snapped a photograph of this building in central Auckland last week because not only does it look beautiful, but I think it has the most effective earthquake strengthening I’ve seen yet. That facade is never falling off! The paediatrician who saw Daniel a couple of weeks ago phoned me this week. She wanted to […]
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Two years on
It has been just over two years now since we were rudely awoken at 4.35am in the morning of 4th of September 2010 at the start of the Cantberbury earthquake sequence. How do I feel now, two years on? I would say that on the whole, I’m pretty good. I don’t register a change in […]
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Paying for air
I met a woman here this week who moved up from Christchurch following the February 2011 earthquake. Not long before that quake, she and her husband bought an inner-city apartment in Christchurch. The entire building got red-stickered shortly after the earthquake and has since been demolished. While their apartment has now gone, the mortgage has […]
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Gorgeous Elizabeth and quakes
Elizabeth is such a cutie. I got some good photos of her this week: The news this morning reports of a Mag. 5.2 earthquake in Victoria, Australia. That’s pretty big for Aussie but reassuringly, it’s the biggest earthquake to hit Victoria for over 109 years. I say reassuringly because although earthquakes happen everywhere, they are […]
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Lest we forget…
It was announced this week that the Christchurch Cathedral, which was badly damaged in the February 22nd earthquake, is to be demolished. My view on the matter is to adopt Joe Bennett’s suggestion which is to leave the cathedral in ruins to commemorate the earthquake itself. I like this idea for two reasons. I know […]
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One year on
We were interviewed by a journalist from The Herald this week and there’s a photo of us in the paper today: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/christchurch-earthquake/news/article.cfm?c_id=1502981&objectid=10787401 He was here for an hour talking to us and it’s funny seeing which bits he chose to put into the article. He described me as “permanently jittery”, ha, ha. I wouldn’t describe […]
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February 22nd, 2011
Tomorrow is the 22nd of February, 2012. This marks the one-year anniversary of the Christchurch earthquake that killed more than 180 people. I don’t want to give a definitive number for the number of people who died in this earthquake because there are some who believe the number to be higher than the official figure […]
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Should Christchurch be moved?
I was pretty shocked to read in the news this morning that 48% of people outside Christchurch believe the city should be moved. If that’s true, then the number of people who believe Wellington should be moved ought to be higher. A quake in Wellington will be much larger, more destructive and more lethal to […]