Bright and sunny day and we reached New Brighton at 12 noon. Everything seemed normal. Not.
The houses are deserted. Some have fences or brick walls collapsed. The roads are very bumpy.
That didn’t bother us much, we still go ahead and park the car, explore the house while waiting for the owner to come back.
This house looked very old. It has many old paintings in the hall.
At first we wanted to walk out then I saw a car turning into the house and I thought the owner must be back. We went back in and greeted the owner. We put our luggage in our respective rooms.
He has given J, K and I a room upstair.
(Pictures taken by K)
The house has a history of 100 years old and it used to be a nunnery. The school opposite has some connection to the house.
We went out to get some food and groceries. The New Brighton Pier at Marine Parade looked very much like the Brighton Pier I saw in UK.
The car park is quite full cos of the people shopping for Christmas. We went to a second hand clothes mall to take a look at the items they have. They have a collection box outside for clothes donated by people, then they sort it out and sell it again.
After that we went to the supermarket. Then K and I went to the Chinese restaurant. I ordered fish and chip while K ordered fried rice. Since it is still sometime before we can get our food, I went to take a stroll nearby. 10 minutes later I sat down at the restaurant waiting for my food, cos it is not yet ready.
At 1.58pm, I was jolted up from my seat. The whole restaurant shook.
In my mind – could it be?? I stood up.
Before I can even react, another stronger jolt came. Lights are off. All the people outside were in panic mood. I ran out with K and asked the locals.
They hadn’t have any quake since June. K said that this is at least a 6. The local advised us to pull our handbrake for the car for fear that it might roll away. We quickly call J and M but getting couldnt get them.
We stood at the same ground and experienced few aftershocks. The petrol station is promptly closed and their firefighters came to make sure it is closed.
(Picture taken by K)
Luckily we still have half a tank. The owner of the restaurant ran out from the restaurant and passed me my fish and chip but could not fry the rice for K anymore. Since the cashtill cant be opened (no electricity), she refunded K from her own pocket. She told K and I that the last quake happened in February. They were all taken by surprised by this quake cos no warning whatsoever beforehand. At this time, a teenage girl scolded vulgarity and said f**k…..i don’t care about tsunami! I think she just shout to vent out her frustration and to hide her fear.
All the people drove their cars off from the car park. The supermarket is closed and all the employees came to assemble at the carpark. Once J and M appeared, we quickly walk towards the car. I asked another local who happened to park next to us what should we do. The local advised us that after this major quake, a lot of aftershocks will come throughout the next 24 hours. He advised us to go to somewhere with more stable foundation rock, like Kaikoura (where we came from) or even Hanmer Springs. He said at this time, electronic payment (EFTPOS) wont be able to work. Important thing is you must have cash.
We went back to the motel which was 2 streets away. We saw a lady sitting at the lawn, very visibly shaken, trying to calm herself down by frantically smoking. She couldn’t even speak coherently when she met us. The owner told us that she lives next door. The owner told M that everytime a quake like this happen, the number of casualties that resulted due to heart attack and stroke is way higher than the actual casualties as a direct result of the tremor. He went out to take a look at the neighbourhood and told us New Brighton bridge is closed and Shirley (where we passed by this morning before hitting New Brighton) is very badly affected. It was not until the next morning when we looked at news paper before we knew the extent and the damage caused by this earthquake.
K download an iphone app that give real time disaster warning/report and we kept reading. The airport was closed. K and I finished the fish and chip at the lawn while more aftershocks come. J told us that just now when the quake first happened, an old lady actually cried and kneeled down on the floor. She was so traumatised. Broke down in tears while trying to call home. Guess it is too much for her.
M and I finally decided that we should move out to somewhere safer where we can catch some sleeps tonight. Since we still have some petrol, we got the refund from the motel owner and took his advice to head out to Queen Elizabeth’s II Way and head towards Belfast. We started to have a glimpse on the extent of damage when we passed Keyes Road.
Traffic lights are no longer working. What we saw while driving past were extremely minor as compared to those that we saw in the news that very night.
(Pictures above taken by K)
Video taken by K as were driving out.
After we turned out from QE2 highway, we noticed that business is as usual at petrol kiosks near Belfast. This is truly a sign of relief. We then drove to the airport, and realized that it is still closed. There is nothing at West Milton and M made a suggestion that we should try calling the motel at Riccarton and see how is it like there. The Best Western at Riccarton (which we were supposed to stay tomorrow) told us that they experienced a strong quake earlier but now they are ok. Their electricity and water supply is intact. We decided to head to that motel. We had dinner at a nearby Chinese restaurant.
After the dinner, we drove to the town to take a look. Very few shops were opened. We went to an asian minimart to get some groceries. The minimart owner told us that he would have closed on usual days if not need to clean up the mess created by the quake earlier.
We drove to take a look at Canterbury University, it is still being closed. Then we went to a pub for a beer to celebrate that we were officially out of imminent trouble. Though minor aftershocks still can be felt but definitely nowhere near what we experienced at New Brighton. Whenever some rattling was felt, we will look at each other with that “could-it-be” look. Even when we were sleeping, I can still feel some quakes (not people walking) happened. The newspaper report the next day confirmed that.
We were busy scrutinizing the news. Liquefactions and cliff collapses affected many coastal parts of Christchurch, and New Brighton was very near the epicenter actually. How did we end up booking a place so close to the epicenter is purely a chance thing. Airport has been reopened 8pm in the evening but many flights were delayed.
You have probably reached the end of the page. But thats not the end of our adventure. Please click the Older Posts link below on right hand side to continue reading.
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