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New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

bbc.co.uk

81–90 of 163 posts

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#82

Damn that is really scary. I used to work in Miramar (Wellington suburbs), which is built on reclaimed sea, if I recall, and everyone was freaked out that a major earthquake would liquify the entire area.

Huh? Miramar is a steep hilly peninsular. Are you talking about Rongotai?

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#83
post #70
post #18

Magnitude 7.5 earthquake. For reference, I felt this in Hamilton, a bit under 1,000 KM away. First earthquake I have ever felt. Hamilton never, ever gets earthquakes. Nevertheless, NZ infrastructure is built to withstand this sort of stuff. Only $100m-1b economic damage is expected, no casualties expected.

The problem with earthquakes is that damage accumulates. So while a building might stay intact or with minor damages during the main one, the aftershocks could wreck havoc. And with an 7.8 aftershocks could last for months and be quite severe. Nevertheless I hope everyone is OK and wish you the best. I've experienced quite a few earthquakes in my life, although nothing over 7, and the shock stays for long. It's one o…

Yes but all multi Tennant buildings and large buildings will be inspected. We're pretty used to this and have some of thebest earthquake engineers in the world.

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#84

Does anybody know the status of RocketLab's facilities [1]? [1] https://rocketlabusa.com/rocket-lab-launch-complex-1-ready-f...

Oh those are well up the North Island, they probably didn't even feel it there. Or if they did, it would have been very mild.

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#85
post #8

Can someone please edit the title? And wow, this looks heavy. I hope everyone is well.

There's that word again. "Heavy." Why are things so heavy in the future? Is there a problem with the Earth's gravitational pull?

People are dead and trapped under collapsed buildings in Kaikora and this is what upsets you?

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#86
post #20

Does anyone know if there is any special effort to construct buildings that can withstand reasonable earthquakes in New Zealand? Christchurch seems particularly prone to quakes in New Zealand. I hope the people of New Zealand are safe.

Yes, there are earthquake standards for new buildings, and mandatory retrofitting for older buildings (as they are updated). From what I've seen, this is pretty similar to San Francisco. It would be interesting to see data comparing the standards across earthquake-prone countries/regions.

I used to work for a structural engineering company that had offices in both NZ and California, from what I understand the standards of earthquake engineering in NZ are higher than in California.

To be honest I think you're probably safer in a large earthquake in a post Christchurch NZ than in a small earthquake in a country that doesn't usually get them.

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#87
post #84

Does anybody know the status of RocketLab's facilities [1]? [1] https://rocketlabusa.com/rocket-lab-launch-complex-1-ready-f...

Oh those are well up the North Island, they probably didn't even feel it there. Or if they did, it would have been very mild.

Yeah my father is in Rotorua and didn't feel it, I'm sure rocketlab are fine.

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#88

Videos of the earthquake: https://youtu.be/WcljQHCUm_o?t=20 https://youtu.be/EsnS28ulJUw News say it's 7.4 - 7.8 magnitude.

Hmm, I doubt that these videos are the NZ quake. It happened at around midnight, and those videos are in broad daylight. EDIT: I see others have already corrected this misinformation.

Those videos look like the earthquake that destroyed a third of Christchurch in 2011.

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#89
post #12

Unfortunately the "Latest Felt Quakes Map" at http://www.weatherwatch.co.nz/geonet doesn't work because the website has exceeded 25,000 map loads in a day.

USGS page on the quake: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/us1000778i#...

Re: New Zealand earthquake: Tsunami follows powerful tremor

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's that word again. "Heavy." Why are things so heavy in the future? Is there a problem with the Earth's gravitational pull?

It's surfer slang, elements of which have made their way into a lot of the English spoken in NZ, Oz and SA.

I don't think it comes from surfing.

It's British (probably Commonwealth) English for serious or important. See usage 6: https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/heavy (unfortunately, no dates given on the quotes).

This lists the usage meaning "severe" as from 1849: http://historicalthesaurus.arts.gla.ac.uk/category/?id=15861...

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