While the USA was experiencing a political earthquake, down at the ends of the earth in New Zealand we were experiencing the real thing.
At 12.02am on Monday 14 November, simultaneously two earthquakes of magnitude 7.6–7.8 struck New Zealand. Although the epicentre was in a rural part of the South Island, their impact was felt throughout the country. 150 miles away in Wellington, we were woken by the quakes and immediately aware these weren’t the regular ‘normal’ earthquakes we experience in these ‘Shaky Isles’.
It was some hours before we were able to return to sleep – multiple aftershocks, the evacuation of all low-lying and coastal areas in our city and suburbs and the constant wail of the tsunami warning alarms (think air-raid sirens) till 3am ensured that. A major earthquake certainly gets your adrenaline pumping!
