Damage to a house in Richmond. A brick chimney has visibly twisted and there are gaps between the bricks. The photographer comments, "Damaged chimney. We'll have to get this taken down tidily, but our roofer friends are a bit busy... (It was taken down on the morning of Day 2, just as well)".
Damage to a house in Richmond. A large crack runs diagonally through a brick wall. The photographer comments, "More cracked brickwork".
Damage to a house in Richmond. A brick chimney has partially collapsed. The photographer comments, "The chimney above our bedroom crumbled - glad it didn't come down in one piece".
A large crack runs through the garden of a house in Richmond. The photographer comments, "Cracks in the vege garden, moving the paving slabs".
Damage to a house in Richmond. Bricks have fallen from a wall, exposing the wooden framing beneath. The photographer comments, "The foundation and a section of the wall of the dining room have shifted and cracked. The dining room floor is very springy".
Damage to a house in Richmond. Part of the brick wall is visibly out of alignment, leaving large gaps at the corner of the house. The photographer comments, "Dining room exterior wall".
Damage to a house in Richmond. Two parts of the house have moved apart, leaving a large gap. The photographer comments, "Dining room exterior wall".
Damage to a house in Richmond. There is a large crack in the driveway, and cracks in the brickwork of a house. The photographer comments, "Tarsealed driveways have numerous cracks".
Residents walk along River Road past large cracks where the road has slumped towards the river. The photographer comments, "Lateral spreading cracks in River Rd; the land left of the crack moved towards the river. The Banks Ave/Dallington Tce end of our block is impassable".
Jane's Bar in the Henry Africa's building is cordoned off with danger tape. The photographer comments, "My local bar is unsafe and can't open. Sad".
Road cones cordon off a large crack in River Road where the road has slumped towards the river. The photographer comments, "Lateral spreading towards the river is very obvious here".
A family walk their dogs down Avonside Drive, while a boy walks past carrying a shovel. In the background, power poles are leaning at extreme angles. The photographer comments, "Power poles in Avonside Drive developed an alarming lean".
Footprints in liquefaction silt on the side of a residential street. The photographer comments, "Silt has accumulated everywhere".
The twisted and broken Medway Street bridge, cordoned off with emergency tape. The photographer comments, "The twisted footbridge at the Medway St corner".
A man photographs large cracks in River Road where the road has slumped towards the river. The photographer comments, "Cracking in River Rd. The Banks Ave/Dallington Tce end of our block is impassable".
The twisted and broken Medway Street bridge, cordoned off with emergency tape. The photographer comments, "The twisted footbridge at the Medway St corner".
One cast iron and perspex turret clock dial with two hands. Originally from the tower of the Christchurch railway station building on Moorehouse Avenue, which later became the science education centre Science Alive!
One cast iron and perspex turret clock dial with two hands. Originally from the tower of the Christchurch railway station building on Moorehouse Avenue, which later became the science education centre Science Alive!
On 4 September 2010, a 7.1 magnitude earthquake struck near Darfield, 40 kilometres west of Christchurch, New Zealand. The quake caused significant damage to land and buildings nearby, with damage extending to Christchurch city. On 22 February 2011, a 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck Christchurch, causing extensive and significant damage across the city and with the loss of 185 lives. Years on from these events, occasional large aftershocks continue to shake the region. Two main entomological collections were situated within close proximity to the 2010/11 Canterbury earthquakes. The Lincoln University Entomology Research Collection, which is housed on the 5th floor of a 7 storey building, was 27.5 km from the 2010 Darfield earthquake epicentre. The Canterbury Museum Entomology Collection, which is housed in the basement of a multi-storeyed heritage building, was 10 km from the 2011 Christchurch earthquake epicentre. We discuss the impacts of the earthquakes on these collections, the causes of the damage to the specimens and facilities, and subsequent efforts that were made to prevent further damage in the event of future seismic events. We also discuss the wider need for preparedness against the risks posed by natural disasters and other catastrophic events.
The city of Christchurch has experienced over 10,000 aftershocks since the 4th of September 2010 earthquake of which approximately 50 have been greater than magnitude 5. The damage caused to URM buildings in Christchurch over this sequence of earthquakes has been well documented. Due to the similarity in age and construction of URM buildings in Adelaide, South Australia and Christchurch (they are sister cities, of similar age and heritage), an investigation was conducted to learn lessons for Adelaide based on the Christchurch experience. To this end, the number of URM buildings in the central business districts of both cities, the extent of seismic strengthening that exists in both cities, and the relative earthquake hazards for both cities were considered. This paper will report on these findings and recommend strategies that the city of Adelaide could consider to significantly reduce the seismic risk posed by URM buildings in future earthquake
he 2016 Building (Earthquake Prone Building) Amendment Act aims to improve the system for managing earthquake-prone buildings. The proposed changes to the Act were precipitated by the Canterbury earthquakes, and the need to improve the seismic safety of New Zealand’s building stock. However, the Act has significant ramifications for territorial authorities, organisations and individuals in small New Zealand towns, since assessing and repairing heritage buildings poses a major cost to districts with low populations and poor rental returns on commercial buildings.
A house in Richmond, seen before the earthquakes.
A house in Avonside, seen before the earthquakes.
A paper prepared for the Bulletin of the New Zealand Society for Earthquake Engineering, Vol. 44, no. 4, December 2011.
The latest two great earthquake sequences; 2010- 2011 Canterbury Earthquake and 2016 Kaikoura Earthquake, necessitate a better understanding of the New Zealand seismic hazard condition for new building design and detailed assessment of existing buildings. It is important to note, however, that the New Zealand seismic hazard map in NZS 1170.5.2004 is generalised in effort to cover all of New Zealand and limited to a earthquake database prior to 2001. This is “common” that site-specific studies typically provide spectral accelerations different to those shown on the national map (Z values in NZS 1170.5:2004); and sometimes even lower. Moreover, Section 5.2 of Module 1 of the Earthquake Geotechnical Engineering Practice series provide the guidelines to perform site- specific studies.
An entry from Deborah Fitchett's blog for 4 September 2010, posted to Livejournal. The entry is titled, "In which an earthquake".The entry was downloaded on 14 April 2015.
An entry from Deborah Fitchett's blog for 4 September 2010, posted to Dreamwidth. The entry is titled, "In which an earthquake".The entry was downloaded on 17 April 2015.
A photograph of the earthquake-damaged output shaft from the top-plate of the Townsend Telescope's clock drive. The output shaft was bent out of shape during the 22 February 2011 earthquake.
A conference paper about the Pipe Damage Assessment Tool (PDAT).
The 2010-2011 Christchurch earthquakes generated damage in several Reinforced Concrete (RC) buildings, which had RC walls as the principal resistant element against earthquake demand. Despite the agreement between structural engineers and researchers in an overall successfully performance there was a lack of knowledge about the behaviour of the damaged structures, and even deeper about a repaired structure, which triggers arguments between different parties that remains up to these days. Then, it is necessary to understand the capacity of the buildings after the earthquake and see how simple repairs techniques improve the building performance. This study will assess the residual capacity of ductile slender RC walls according to current standards in New Zealand, NZS 3101.1 2006 A3. First, a Repaired RC walls Database is created trying to gather previous studies and to evaluate them with existing international guidelines. Then, an archetype building is designed, and the wall is extracted and scaled. Four half-scale walls were designed and will be constructed and tested at the Structures Testing Laboratory at The University of Auckland. The overall dimensions are 3 [m] height, 2 [m] length and 0.175 [m] thick. All four walls will be identical, with differences in the loading protocol and the presence or absence of a repair technique. Results are going to be useful to assess the residual capacity of a damaged wall compare to the original behaviour and also the repaired capacity of walls with simpler repair techniques. The expected behaviour is focussed on big changes in stiffness, more evident than in previously tested RC beams found in the literature.