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Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of parts of the Townsend Telescope recovered from the rubble of the Observatory tower. The telescope was housed in the tower at the Christchurch Arts Centre. It was severely damaged when the tower collapsed during the 22 February 2011 earthquake.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of the earthquake damage to the Observatory tower at the Christchurch Arts Centre. The top two storeys of the tower collapsed during the 22 February 2011 earthquake and the rubble spilled into the courtyard in front. A digger was used to clear the rubble away from the building. A tarpaulin has been draped over the top of the tower.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of the middle section of the Townsend Telescope. The telescope is in the Observatory at the Christchurch Arts Centre. A plate on the side reads, "T Cook & Sons, 1864, York & London". This image was used by Graeme Kershaw, Technician at the University of Canterbury Department of Physics and Astronomy, to identify the telescope's parts after the 22 February 2011 earthquake.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of the earthquake-damaged Observatory tower at the Christchurch Arts Centre. The photograph was taken using a cellphone camera. The top of the tower collapsed during the 22 February 2011 earthquake. The rubble from the tower has been cleared and a tarpaulin has been placed over the top of the broken tower. Tyres have been placed on the tarpaulin to hold it down. A temporary roof has also been constructed over the tower to keep out the rain.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of the Townsend Telescope. The telescope is in the Observatory at the Christchurch Arts Centre. A plate on the side reads, "T Cook & Sons, 1864, York & London". This image was used by Graeme Kershaw, Technician at the University of Canterbury Department of Physics and Astronomy, to identify the telescope's parts after the 22 February 2011 earthquake.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of the earthquake damage to the Observatory tower at the Christchurch Arts Centre. The top two storeys of the tower collapsed during the 22 February 2011 earthquake and the rubble spilled into the courtyard in front. A digger was used to clear the rubble away from the building. A tarpaulin has been draped over the top of the broken tower and the roof behind.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of the Observatory tower at the Christchurch Arts Centre. There are cracks in the masonry of the tower near where the two storeys join. The cracks formed as a result of the 4 September 2010 earthquake.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of the earthquake damage to the second story of the Observatory tower at the Christchurch Arts Centre. The front of the storey has collapsed, exposing the inside. A tarpaulin has been draped over the top and the roof of the building behind.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

The University of Canterbury's E-Learning team's temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. Getting sorted. Most gear in place, still making adjustments".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A member of the University of Canterbury's E-Learning team in their temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. Room 709 sofas".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A member of the University of Canterbury's E-Learning team in their temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. Our office, Room 709".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

The InTentCity 6.3 Cafe, which was set up in a tent in the Law car park while University of Canterbury buildings were closed for structural testing. The photographer comments, "The University restarts its teaching, and the techies in e-learning move out of NZi3. New cafe - InTentCity. (Get it...?)".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A crane beside the boiler chimney in the University of Canterbury's Facilities Management yard. The photographer comments, "The University restarts its teaching, and the techies in e-learning move out of NZi3. Inspection and repairs to the University's boiler system. It's getting cooler, we'll need heat soon - but we need accessible buildings first".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

The University of Canterbury's E-Learning team's temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. Jess's desk. Viewed from my side of the couch".

Videos, UC QuakeStudies

A video of a presentation by Associate Professor John Vargo during the fifth plenary of the 2016 People in Disasters Conference. Vargo is a senior researcher and co-leader of the Resilient Organisations Research Programme at the University of Canterbury. The presentation is titled, "Organisational Resilience is more than just Business Continuity".The abstract for this presentation reads as follows: Business Continuity Management is well-established process in many larger organisations and a key element in their emergency planning. Research carried out by resilient organisations follow the 2010 and 2011 Canterbury Earthquakes show that most small organisations did not have a business continuity plan (BCP), yet many of these organisations did survive the massive disruptions following the earthquakes. They were resilient to these catastrophic events, but in the absence of a BCP. This research also found that many of the organisations with BCP's, struggled to use them effectively when facing real events that did not align with the BCP. Although the BCPs did a good job of preparing organisations to deal with technology and operational disruptions, there was virtually no coverage for the continuity of people. Issues surrounding staff welfare and engagement were amongst the most crucial issues faced by Canterbury organisations, yet impacts of societal and personal disruption did not feature in BCPs. Resilience is a systematic way of looking at how an organization can survive a crisis and thrive in an uncertain world. Business continuity is an important aspect for surviving the crisis, but it is only part of the bigger picture addressed by organisational resilience. This presentation will show how organizational experiences in the Canterbury earthquakes support the need to move to a 'Business Continuity' for the '21st Century', one that incorporates more aspects of resilience, especially the 'people' areas of leadership, culture, staff welfare, and engagement.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

The University of Canterbury's E-Learning team's temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. Reception. This is where students used to come to enquire about support services".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A view of the UBS building at the University of Canterbury, seen from level 7 of the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. The University Book Shop building".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A member of the University of Canterbury's E-Learning team in their temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. South view over trees to the hills".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

Members of the University of Canterbury's E-Learning team Jess Hollis and Alan Hoskin in their temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. Room 709 - Jess & Alan".

Research papers, University of Canterbury Library

This is a joint Resilience Framework undertaken by the Electrical, Computer and Software Engineering Department of the University of Auckland in association with West Power and Orion networks and partially funded by the New Zealand National Science Challenge and QuakeCoRE. The Energy- Communication research group nearly accomplished two different researches focusing on both asset resilience and system resilience. Asset resilience research which covers underground cables system in Christchurch region is entitled “2010-2011 Canterbury Earthquake Sequence Impact on 11KV Underground Cables” and system resilience research which covers electricity distribution and communication system in West Coast region is entitled “NZ Electricity Distribution Network Resilience Assessment and Restoration Models following Major Natural Disturbance“. As the fourth milestone of the aforementioned research project, the latest outcome of both projects has been socialised with the stakeholders during the Cigre NZ 2019 Forum.

Research papers, University of Canterbury Library

Overview of SeisFinder SeisFinder is an open-source web service developed by QuakeCoRE and the University of Canterbury, focused on enabling the extraction of output data from computationally intensive earthquake resilience calculations. Currently, SeisFinder allows users to select historical or future events and retrieve ground motion simulation outputs for requested geographical locations. This data can be used as input for other resilience calculations, such as dynamic response history analysis. SeisFinder was developed using Django, a high-level python web framework, and uses a postgreSQL database. Because our large-scale computationally-intensive numerical ground motion simulations produce big data, the actual data is stored in file systems, while the metadata is stored in the database. The basic SeisFinder architecture is shown in Figure 1.

Research papers, University of Canterbury Library

We measure the longer-term effect of a major earthquake on the local economy, using night-time light intensity measured from space, and investigate whether insurance claim payments for damaged residential property affected the local recovery process. We focus on the destructive Canterbury Earthquake Sequence (CES) 2010 -2011 as our case study. Uniquely for this event, more than 95% of residential housing units were covered by insurance, but insurance payments were staggered over 5 years, enabling us to identify their local impact. We find that night-time luminosity can capture the process of recovery and describe the recovery’s determinants. We also find that insurance payments contributed significantly to the process of economic recovery after the earthquake, but delayed payments were less affective and cash settlement of claims were more effective than insurance-managed repairs in contributing to local recovery.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

The University of Canterbury's E-Learning team's temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. House bar. This reception desk is not used now. A small kitchen is at the right".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

Students sit outside the InTentCity 6.3 Cafe, which was set up in a tent in the Law car park while University of Canterbury buildings were closed for structural testing. The photographer comments, "The University restarts its teaching, and the techies in e-learning move out of NZi3. The cafe has an outside seating area under the trees".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

Alan Hoskin, a member of the University of Canterbury's E-Learning team, in their temporary office in the James Hight building. The photographer comments, "First looks at our new temporary (maybe) office space. Our group will stay here until April or May 2011, then will move to another floor in the Central Library. Bean bag. Alan wanted the beanbag but Jess said no".

Videos, UC QuakeStudies

A video of a presentation by Professor David Johnston during the fourth plenary of the 2016 People in Disasters Conference. Johnston is a Senior Scientist at GNS Science and Director of the Joint Centre for Disaster Research in the School of Psychology at Massey University. The presentation is titled, "Understanding Immediate Human Behaviour to the 2010-2011 Canterbury Earthquake Sequence, Implications for injury prevention and risk communication".The abstract for the presentation reads as follows: The 2010 and 2011 Canterbury earthquake sequences have given us a unique opportunity to better understand human behaviour during and immediately after an earthquake. On 4 September 2010, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake occurred near Darfield in the Canterbury region of New Zealand. There were no deaths, but several thousand people sustained injuries and sought medical assistance. Less than 6 months later, a magnitude 6.2 earthquake occurred under Christchurch City at 12:51 p.m. on 22 February 2011. A total of 182 people were killed in the first 24 hours and over 7,000 people injured overall. To reduce earthquake casualties in future events, it is important to understand how people behaved during and immediately after the shaking, and how their behaviour exposed them to risk of death or injury. Most previous studies have relied on an analysis of medical records and/or reflective interviews and questionnaire studies. In Canterbury we were able to combine a range of methods to explore earthquake shaking behaviours and the causes of injuries. In New Zealand, the Accident Compensation Corporation (a national health payment scheme run by the government) allowed researchers to access injury data from over 9,500 people from the Darfield (4 September 2010) and Christchurch (22 February 2011 ) earthquakes. The total injury burden was analysed for demography, context of injury, causes of injury, and injury type. From the injury data inferences into human behaviour were derived. We were able to classify the injury context as direct (immediate shaking of the primary earthquake or aftershocks causing unavoidable injuries), and secondary (cause of injury after shaking ceased). A second study examined people's immediate responses to earthquakes in Christchurch New Zealand and compared responses to the 2011 earthquake in Hitachi, Japan. A further study has developed a systematic process and coding scheme to analyse earthquake video footage of human behaviour during strong earthquake shaking. From these studies a number of recommendations for injury prevention and risk communication can be made. In general, improved building codes, strengthening buildings, and securing fittings will reduce future earthquake deaths and injuries. However, the high rate of injuries incurred from undertaking an inappropriate action (e.g. moving around) during or immediately after an earthquake suggests that further education is needed to promote appropriate actions during and after earthquakes. In New Zealand - as in US and worldwide - public education efforts such as the 'Shakeout' exercise are trying to address the behavioural aspects of injury prevention.

Research papers, University of Canterbury Library

Geospatial liquefaction models aim to predict liquefaction using data that is free and readily-available. This data includes (i) common ground-motion intensity measures; and (ii) geospatial parameters (e.g., among many, distance to rivers, distance to coast, and Vs30 estimated from topography) which are used to infer characteristics of the subsurface without in-situ testing. Since their recent inception, such models have been used to predict geohazard impacts throughout New Zealand (e.g., in conjunction with regional ground-motion simulations). While past studies have demonstrated that geospatial liquefaction-models show great promise, the resolution and accuracy of the geospatial data underlying these models is notably poor. As an example, mapped rivers and coastlines often plot hundreds of meters from their actual locations. This stems from the fact that geospatial models aim to rapidly predict liquefaction anywhere in the world and thus utilize the lowest common denominator of available geospatial data, even though higher quality data is often available (e.g., in New Zealand). Accordingly, this study investigates whether the performance of geospatial models can be improved using higher-quality input data. This analysis is performed using (i) 15,101 liquefaction case studies compiled from the 2010-2016 Canterbury Earthquakes; and (ii) geospatial data readily available in New Zealand. In particular, we utilize alternative, higher-quality data to estimate: locations of rivers and streams; location of coastline; depth to ground water; Vs30; and PGV. Most notably, a region-specific Vs30 model improves performance (Figs. 3-4), while other data variants generally have little-to-no effect, even when the “standard” and “high-quality” values differ significantly (Fig. 2). This finding is consistent with the greater sensitivity of geospatial models to Vs30, relative to any other input (Fig. 5), and has implications for modeling in locales worldwide where high quality geospatial data is available.