6.3 Destructive Earthquake

AT 12:51pm today Christchurch was hit by a 6.3 magnitude earthquake. Unlike the 7.1 earthquake on 4 Sep 2010 which was 40km away from the city and 10km deep, this one was just 10km from the city centre and only 5km deep. The result - devastating destruction with many lives lost.
We most definitely felt the earthquake and a number of the aftershocks at home (around an hour from town) but what made it more scary for us was that Brendon was in town at a conference. We were very thankful that text messages were able to get through and so we knew he was ok. We were all very relieved when he arrived home that evening (around 6pm as it took them ages to get home).

Christchurch Cathedral - before and after. Possibly 20 people buried in the rubble.

And just to point out that the coloured tip of the spire was not the original. An earthquake in 1888 brought the brick tip down but it was replaced. In 1901 the top of the spire came down in another earthquake and so was replaced with the well known coloured tip. This is such a landmark for Christchurch and New Zealand.

There are a number of streets which look like this. The entire front of the buildings just fallen down.

The PGG building before.......

and after. Just so frightening.

Already there are amazing stories of many people getting out of this building alive.

And then the worst story. The CTV building before....

and after.

With well over 100 people in this building this will be were the majority of the death toll comes from. So terribly sad.