New Zealand plans rescue of tourists stranded by earthquake

Earthquake damage on State Highway One near Ohau Point on the South Island’s east coast. Mark Mitchell / New Zealand Herald Pool Photo via AP

WELLINGTON // New Zealand is planning to send in military helicopters and a navy ship to rescue about 1,000 tourists and hundreds of residents who remain stranded in the coastal town of Kaikoura after a powerful earthquake on Monday cut off train and vehicle access.

The magnitude-7.8 quake struck the South Island just at 12.02am, killing at least two people, triggering a small tsunami and setting off hundreds of strong aftershocks. It also brought down rocks and mud that swept across highways and cracked apart roads.

Home to about 2,000 residents, Kaikoura is a popular destination for travellers taking part in whale-watching expeditions or wanting a stopover with mountain views. But the quake knocked out water supplies and sewerage systems and left people with no easy way out.

“From all directions, Kaikoura has essentially been isolated,” said Air Commodore Darryn Webb, the acting commander of New Zealand’s joint forces.

“There’s a real imperative to support the town because it can’t support itself.”

Mr Webb said the military planned to begin using four NH90 helicopters on Tuesday that could each transport about 18 people out of the town at a time. He said a ship was also leaving Auckland on Monday that could potentially pick up hundreds of people if weather conditions allowed.

He said the weather forecast was not looking great and the operation could take several days. If needed, he said, a C-130 military transport plane could drop fuel, water, food and other supplies to the town.

The earthquake that struck was unusual in that a big event on one fault may have immediately triggered a big event on a second fault, experts said.

“When an earthquake occurs you are changing the stress field immediately, and if there was one fault that was pretty close to breaking, the energy from an earthquake can just tip it over the edge so that may have been what happened today,” said Adam Pascale, head of Australia’s Seismology Research Centre.

New Zealand’s GNS Science agency principal scientist Kelvin Barrowman said: “It seems like the earthquake was more like two earthquakes, but very closely spaced in time.”

What remains unknown, and disconcerting, is whether the high number of aftershocks were just that, or “foreshocks” preceding another large quake.

Elsewhere, strong aftershocks continued to shake New Zealand on Monday, rattling the nerves of exhausted residents. The country was largely spared the devastation it saw in 2011 when an earthquake struck the city of Christchurch and killed 185 people. That quake was one of New Zealand’s worst disasters, causing an estimated $25 billion in damage.

Monday’s quake caused damage in Wellington, the capital, and was also strongly felt in Christchurch. Residents said the shaking went on for about three minutes.

Police said one person died in Kaikoura and another in Mt Lyford, a nearby ski resort.

Prime minister John Key flew over the destruction in Kaikoura by helicopter as aftershocks kicked up dust from the landslides below.

“It’s just utter devastation,” Mr Key said.

* Associated Press and Reuters