Christchurch, before Saturday's earthquake
New Zealand’s Christchurch remains in a state of emergency, since suffering the country’s most destructive earthquake in almost 80 years on Saturday morning.
The quake, which registered at 7.1 on the Richter scale, is believed to have caused damage estimated at costing up to $2 billion. Nobody was killed.
Bob Parker, the South Island capital’s mayor, described the damage as immense. He said it was an “absolute miracle” that no-one had died. Up to 500 buildings are believed to have been damaged by the quake, which had its epicentre 20km west of the city.
As such, many hostels and businesses in the city are closed until at least Wednesday, when the state of emergency is expected to be lifted. Until then, much of the CBD is off-limits while experts assess the extent of buildings’ structural damage.
While power has since been restored, large parts of the city remain without running water.
New Zealand, situated on the meeting of two tectonic plates in a region labelled the Pacific Ring of Fire, experiences over 14,000 earthquakes a year. However, only about 20 exceed a magnitude 5.0.
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