Don't tell anyone anything: Canterbury Earthquake Update, A few Days Later

One Of The Main City Roads

It's Been three days since the 7.1 earthquake struck the Canterbury area and already a clean up is well underway. After the first hit woke my family, out came the candles and well, mum's Bird Flu Box from 2006 which I found very funny. Indeed the time had come when we needed to use it (much to mums joy as well). Inside was pretty much everything you would need to survive ...... bird flu, yes we had about 8 boxes of tissues and several doses of paracetamol and ibuprofen as for water we used of clever evolved minds and filled up a massive cooler thingy in the bath tub (just in time as the water cut off.)

The Destruction.

After all that drama the txt's start coming through. Mums getting extremely angry at people who are clogging up the system and 'wasting battery time' asking silly questions and txting back things like 'cool' and 'ok'. As it's 5 in the Morning you can understand how my brother and I became bored, all this waiting for news and aftershocks (we both just wanted bed), but alas no the parents step in and deem the rest of the house unsafe. This means family sleepover!!! .... yay...

My brother and I snatch out all the bedding and make ourselves comfortable on a couch each I get out the good old i-pod and get watching 'Chiddy Chiddy Bang Bang' as its the only movie I've got stored (what the hell was I thinking). However the fun ends soon as mum spots me it's game over because I'm 'wasting battery' that I will later appreciate.

Christchurch's inner City

During the day we hear more and more stories on the quake via the radio, people having their chimneys smash through their bedrooms and family cars being crushed by debris. It's only when we finally get out for a drive to check a rental property that I realise how bad the damage really is. On the way we encounter many fallen chimneys, smashed down fences, sand volcanoes and road humps left over from the shock waves, and this is just heading a block down the road!

Remains

As we get to the house we notice one of our concrete fences has totally mushed the neighbours garden in one long flat strip,'FLOP'. When we go inside, the damage is minor but still there, a massive crack runs along the perimeter of the lounge celling, a door no longer opens, there's a sink in the roof of my old bedroom and a few cupboard doors are open.

Lucky the previous tenants had just moved out otherwise there would have been furniture tossed around too. After all our inspections have been made we remember the previous tenants had had a stash of supplies in one of the bigger cupboards in case of a natural disaster. So we manage to get hands on 15 litres of water. Problem solved!

Whats left of a car in the central city

That night mum and I decided to sleep in the lounge because our beds were not really ideally placed for an earthquake or any other aftershocks. Two mattresses flop down beside each other in front of the fire. Later mum suggests I be aware of the fire that could still move forward and crush my head if there was another aftershock. Not the most reassuring thing to hear before you go to bed, but i figure if the 7.1 didn't move it, then how could an aftershock of 5.4? (or so I tell myself).

Ripped apart.

After a night of after shocks (many of which I slept through) we are up and ready to tackle day two. Boil and bleach the water (now that its on), get the phone hooked up properly and get into the clean up. Fortunately there's not much for us to do. The cat returns home now only for food however (the snob) and that night he snoozes on one of my backpacks in my room before desperately scratching to be let out, then dashing out the cat flap. 'Bring it on' I think, as another shock hits and I ride the wave with joy, then continue with my very important sleep.

No school till next Monday and mock exams have been postponed! Damn right they have. I will be sure to post further updates and will leave you with these photos.