At a Loss for Words

[Gary Smith]

After watching the terrible consequences that Mother Nature unleashed on Christchurch two days ago, to say that I am totally gutted would be an understatement.

It is still hard to come to terms with the fact that a little over two weeks ago I was enjoying a wonderful time in Christchurch, doing all of the touristy things, visiting the Cathedral, punting on the Avon River, riding the trams around the beautiful city centre and overall enjoying a host of things that such a vibrant city had to offer. Even the weather turned it on and we had a terrific time.

Now as I sit here and watch Sky News, sadly witnessing first hand the devastation and tragic loss of life, seeing familiar places in a now different light, and then suddenly realising that I was there just a short time ago, I am completely gob smacked.

Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Christchurch at such a terrible time. Let's hope that the restructuring of the city and the rebuilding of lives and families is not too painful for all those concerned.

As the old saying goes "No news is good news", however Is there any word on the welfare of our friends from the area?

Regards,
Gary.

[philipdp]

You will be pleased to know Ray and Kurt are ok. They were on teamspeak last night

[Gary Smith]

Great news Phil, thanks for that.

Regards,
Gary

[Mark Sheppard]

May I humbly echo your sentiment and thoughts regarding this tragic event Gary. As you say, it is difficult to find the right words to convey compassion when the agony of loss is so great.
Mark

[Tony Forrest]

Having lived in the Canterbury area for many years whilst a member of the New Zealand Army, I too have wonderful memories of Christchurch and of the old Rangatera docking in Lyttleton. Seeing the devastation there now is totally gut wrenching.
I still have friends in the area and all are well, my family there though passed many years ago.

Tomorrow morning, some very good friends of mine from The New South Wales Police are deploying to Christchurch to assist with the Search and Rescue and local policing.

Those carrying out SAR in Christchurch all deserve medals, some of the heroic stories coming out of there defy imagination. They say that the window of opportunity to find those that are still trapped in the rubble is near an end. This is not so, the weather conditions in Christchurch are not extreme, and there is still a good chance that some of those missing will be found alive. One of my friends from here is leading one of the SAR teams and his hopes are still high that if there still are survivors in pockets of the rubble the news should be good. But it will still take time as searches of this nature are of a necessity very slow.

My thoughts are with all involved in this tragedy of nature.

[Geoff Thomson]

Hi Guys
Yes it is not good down there. My sister whom I managed to contact some twelve hours after the quake is okay but she has lost her house and all her possessions.
I just received the latest weather report from NIWA for today and it is good as they are expecting high gale force N'westers which will bring a lot of hot hot weather but will also cause a lot of the silt which has been piled up to be removed to be blown all over the city.
All we are praying for now is that Wellington don't get hit by a major earthquake as that would really stretch resources at the present time.
I reckon that if welly got a big quake like that they would have a lot more deaths as most of the inner cbd is built on reclaimed land and as for the multi story buildings I don't think they would stand up to a big shallow quake like that as they would more than likely sink into the ground with the liquification which would occur.
It is good to hear that Ray and Kurt are both safe and my heart goes out to all cantabrians in the sacrifices they have made.
There are certainly a lot of heroes down there who have put their lives on the line without even thinking to save people in those first few hours before emergency staff were fully mobilised.