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They upgraded the quake to 7.5 after getting input from instruments in the USA, and have said it was actually two quakes, one triggering the other. Chris spent the night as hospital liaison at Civil Defense, and did not get home till midday. I stayed up till 4am sharing reports from a police scanner with the camera club Facebook Group.
Only two people died, and one of those probably died if a heart attack, but it is incredible the casualty list was so low. The main problem now is that the main north/south road and rail link to Christchurch is totally buggered, and the nature of the road means they can't get heavy equipment to the innermost slips and downed bridges, until they fix the problems en route, so only one can be worked on at a time. Well one at each end I imagine.
A lighthouse on Cape Campbell — about 20 miles from me — moved two metres NE and dropped a metre in hight.
This has to be the most amazing imagery from the event. They have freed the cows now, by digging a ramp, but they didn't film it. 😞
This shows the serial nature of the coastal road. You couldn't even get in via barge because of the rocks.
There are short tunnels all along this stretch, and they were probably the safest place to be when it happened, except for the strong chance of being trapped inside
Typical Kiwi attire
You'll see what I mean. You can't clear this one until you can get past the previous slip
I don't know if this person got their truck out, but they will have need clean underwear!
This is typical of what has happened to some of the bridges, but others have dropped a lot more than this.
This is a ramp for unloading Cook Strait ferries at Wellington. I don't know where are now, but at least one ferry was stuck out ion the Sounds for 12 hours unable to land and unload. There was damage to ramps both ends of the ferry run.
I went into Blenheim to do my Citizens Advice shift, and found the Community Center was only just opening at midday because they hadn't declared it safe. I saw large plate glass windows being changed in several shop fronts, and a lot of shops still closed. We are getting constant after shocks — the room is rocking quite badly as I type this now — and it makes you feel quite nauseous.
So our biggest problem is resupplying the supermarkets, and petrol stations etc. It is doable, but via the west coast and double the distance, which we have been told will be reflected with prices. But as they say here 'She'll be right'.
Jane, I don't know if you know that John Kerry was still in Christchurch when the big quake hit, on his way home from Antarctica? That would have been about the same distance from the epicenter than we were, so he would have had a serious earthquake experience. I don't know if that was a driving factor, but the USA offered large helicopters and a P3 Orion to assist with the aftermath. The tourists stranded in Kaikoura are being shipped out via NZ navy ships.
The main quake has now been upgraded to 7.8 — I don't know how they work it out, but I believe the more data they get from around the world, the more accurate their assessment. I keep hearing more information about destroyed buildings, but the spookiest story concerns the Blenheim Menz Shed, of which I am the secretary. We have wood and metalworking equipment, and make stuff for community organizations and personal projects. Sadly, one of our members died at the weekend, and when our president visited the shed after the quake to see if there was any damage, he opened the cupboard containing the tea and coffee mugs, and out of 30 mugs, the only one that had broken belonged to the dead member.
We are starting to get _very_ concerned about the earthquake aftermath at the moment, as the ramifications look like turning out to be massive. They might never reopen the coast road, and there's talk of permanently rerouting the ferries bypassing Picton. Those two things together will kill our county, (Marlborough) and put an awful lot of people out of work, and/or destroy businesses that rely on tourism.
The insurance companies are saying they are not prepared to transfer policies to new owners of existing properties, and might not insure new properties. That will cause the housing market to crash here. We have three rental properties that might end up being difficult to find tenants for.
Kaikoura might only be reachable via the Inland Road which, while nice, does not come close to the coastal road. It would be like California closing the PCH — unthinkable. The Kaikoura whale boats are high and dry in their docks because the sea bed was raised two metres. That is probably not going to be hard to fix, but we are not even sure if the whales will still be there because the quake disrupted the ecosystem that attracts them. Plus a lot of shell fish have been stranded high and dry by the raised seabed. Volunteers are trying to move them into the sea, but it is too big a job for them to have much impact.
A surprising factor is how badly Wellington has fared. Two year old multistory government buildings might have to come down. A multistory car park is in 'imminent danger of collapse'. Large parts of the central business district are cordoned off, and the port is baly affected.
We are well into the 2000s regards aftershocks. It feels like the ground is constantly moving, and gives you motion sickness. All together, not flash at all! 
Disasters like this bring out the best and the worst in people. We have a cult religion here call Destiny Church. It's members are typically Maori and Pacific Islanders, and include a lot of ex-gang members and otherwise some of the poorest people in our country. It is great that it gives these people focus, and a lot of them are holding down jobs for the first time in their lives, but as is so often the way of these things, its leader Brian Tamaki and his wife live a life of luxury on the contributions of its members. His wife attracted bad press this year after buying her second luxury car
Now Brian Tamaki has laid the blame for the 7.8 earthquake squarely on the shoulders of gay people.
Controversial Bishop Brian Tamaki blames gay people for New Zealand earthquakes | Daily Mail Online
I think Brian Tamaki should start a relief fund for quake victims by having a slapathon. People would get the chance to slap the loony self appointed bishop with how hard, and how many times, according to the size of their donation. I'd give serious money to be at the front of the queue!
Thanks for your interest guys. Some things are starting to come under control now, in a Kiwi number 8 wire sort of a way. The Cook Strait ferries are now taking foot passengers, but I doubt the route they now have to take to get on and off the boats would pass health & safety rules in the USA and UK.
There is talk of the Kaikoura Inland route being open by the end of the weekend, but there will be a lot of single lane stretches, and the going will rough. The first video on this page actually shows State Highway 1 south of me towards Kaikoura, but the Inland road will be every bit as bad. It just won't have the huge slips that have completely blocked SH1
New video shows just how damaged SH1 is after the Kaikoura quake | Stuff.co.nz
To put the open road into perspective, what they are doing is building ramps by dumping aggregate (road building sharp edged gravel) and leveling it out with a grader. It still makes for a very rough drive, and I suspect quite a worrying one in places. We had some serious rain since the big quake, which is making for potential slips on the Inland road.
Aftershocks are well past the 3000 now. I couldn't see a time frame for this chart, but it shows the most recent 1500. You can zoom in and click on a coloured circle for time and other data HERE
For me, the worst thing is the motion sickness. You not sure, half the time, whether it is an aftershock or just you moving, but a lot of the aftershocks are really big jolts that leave you in no doubt. If you are driving, or even just walking, you are far less likely to feel them.
We have also reached the stage where lack of drinking water, and even enough water to ensure good hygiene is taking its toll. The road below is on the approach to a small town called Waiau which was much closer to the epicenter, but seems to be getting less support than Kaikoura. As a result they now have an outbreak of Norovirus which is going to sweep through that town in days. Imagine that without running water. It's what you'd expect in third world disaster zones, but it's disappointing that it has happened in New Zealand.
BTW what they will do in a situation like above, is push a ramp up next to the road with a digger or JCB. Every farmer has an old digger and or bulldozer in rural NZ. But you can see how wet it is, so strictly four wheel drive unless you want to get stuck.
Jane, I don't know of any relief fund but the Red Cross would be a good place to donate to. They organize special deliveries to cut off areas.
The aftershocks have slowed right down now, but there was a 5.0 yesterday. The Inland Road to Kaikoura should be open today or tomorrow, but it will still be cordoned and you'll need to justify your visit (no sightseers and rubber neckers).
Some other minor roads are causing big problems for local farmers because they are currently allowing no access at all. The farmers are arguing that the first 20 kilometers is usable with care (it will be a walk in the park compared to the terrain an NZ sheep farmer is used to). I think this will be resolved today after it went on TV news.
At any one time, there will be hundreds of people up on a mountain somewhere in New Zealand tramping and sleeping in the DoC (Department of Conservation) huts or camping.
This man was right on the tops and very near the epicenter when the big quake hit. It's an interesting story, and a scary experience. I've climbed in the UK and in NZ, and where the UK is very old and its mountains solid, in NZ the tops are loose and crumbly at the best of times. Things would get pretty tricky after a 7.8 quake.
The damage in Wellington keeps getting upgraded with several large buildings looking like they will have to be demolished. At least one of these was only two years old, so I think they are going to need to rethink the building codes in quake prone areas. As a for instance, one of the shops in Blenheim lost two plate glass windows during the big quake, and after they were fixed and the foot path reopened, a third plate glass window exploded out onto the pavement several days later. They don't want to close the central Wellington business district (CBD) because of the cost to economy, so they are taking a chance. We are all hoping this does not come back and bite them.
Remember that in Christchurch the first big quake was in September six years ago, with little damage and few injuries. There is always a chance of a big quake in the months following an initial one, and it was the following February that the disastrous quake flattened half of Christchurch killing >200 people, and that quake was not as powerful as the September one.
From here on it's going to be a very slow process. Most of Kaikoura will soon have water, but it will need boiling to drink. The sewer system is going to take a long time to fix. In Christchurch people were having to use Portaloos two to three years after the big quake. It won't take that long for Kaikoura because it is so much smaller, but they could be months without a sewer system.
Meanwhile their lively hood is collapsing because the tourists can't get to them, and realistically, that is going to remain the case for a couple of years, because that's how long it will take to fix the coast road, and not many people will use the dead end Inland road to Kaikoura because it doesn't fit well with any post quake tourist routes.
The yellow route below is now the best road between Christchurch and Blenheim, and beyond to the ferry terminal in Picton (to get to the North Island via Wellington). Note that this crosses the Lewis Pass which is closed for days at a time every year because of snow. The same would be true of both Arthurs Pass and Haast Pass so there would be no possible road route during bad winter weather. The yellow road is also not even close as attractive as the coast road, so if you happen to be a tourist coming into Christchurch this summer, you would cross Arthurs Pass all the way to the West Coast. That is a beautiful road all the way.
The cyan road is the Inland Road, and is going to be the only way into Kaikoura for a very long time. Not too terrible for the people who live there, but a big ask for tourists.
The coast road (Red) has massive damage to both road and rail track. That includes some big bridges so the coast and time are both going to be huge. The government are not panicking because our economy has been doing well, and they had funds ready for such an occurrence, but I am sure that other roading projects will now be delayed by years.
So that's where we are at, and nothing much is going to change from here on. We are really thankful to the US navy that happened to be visiting NZ, and who used it's big helicopters to get emergency supplies into cut off areas. People with businesses on the coast road are basically buggered and I don't see how they can survive. But things change and life goes on. Businesses on the Yellow route are now thriving with hotels full and likely to stay so, but the downside is a ten fold increase in traffic. (note that will still seem like a trickle compared to the USA and UK roads)
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