Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Christchurch earthquake

No relief from natural disasters in this corner of the world. This time the tragedy has struck New Zealand town of Christchurch. A powerful and shallow earthquake of 6.3 in magnitude, with epicentre just about 10 km south from the town centre, has severely shaken the city knocking down many houses and office blocks. Current death toll stands at 65 but hundreds are reported missing. My heart goes out to all those affected, especially those who lost loved ones.




Spatial community in New Zealand has quickly mobilised and deployed Ushahidi platform to assist with dissemination of vital information from authorities as well as that reported by individuals in the affected areas: http://eq.org.nz/


More maps of the event:
- US Geological Survey site
- aus-emaps.com publishes earthquake information on a shareable map (this link includes shake modelling for Christchurch earthquake)
- Geosciene Australia map with seismograms

1 comment:

  1. That’s going to go on for about 2 days, most likely. And don’t be surprised if there are some 5.x size aftershocks in there. Anyone doing S&R needs to be VERY aware.And everyone else should recheck their gas and water lines after the aftershocks. Sometimes the main one just softens things up for the smaller aftershocks to do the real damage.

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