2.22.11 Thoughts to all those in Christchurch on this horrendous day. The 6.3 quake hit shortly before 1pm, with tremendous damage and loss of life in that incredible city filled with the a most friendly people. So undeserving of this tragedy, as the city was on the cusp of recuperating from the one 6 months prior.
The city also had a great meaning to the program, as it is the main point of departure to McMurdo, Ross Sea, and the Pole for the USAP, and the years of working with the Kiwi government, program, and their people meant strong interpersonal ties with the folks in Christchurch. Many veterans of the program have close friends there, and at the time of the quake, 595 USAP participants, staff were in the area. Many were the summer season personnel that had just gotten off the Ice and was about to embark on their travels home, and some were personnel heading to the Ice for the winter season. The hotels where they stayed were greatly affected. The three principle one: the Windsor, the Grand Chancellor, and the Hotel So/All Seasons were uninhabitable, with the former 2 sustaining significant damage (parts of the Windsor collapsed, and the towering Grand Chancellor lost some its main support structure and is leaning up against the So, fearing imminent collapse and destroying the city block). Many of the USAP participants had to be housed at the CDC (USAP clothing distribution center), lucky to have gotten out alive even without any documents or personal property or shoes. It was an incredible stroke of luck that all were accounted for, and at worst only had some minor injuries.
Back at the station, many of us saw in disbelief what had happened as events unfolded, seeing the area we had just passed through about a week ago so ravaged, identifying structures that we visited, looking to see any of our friends shown up on TV, emailing/facebooking to find the whereabouts of our friends and railing at the moronic TV reporters that keep pestering the aid workers. We also wondered about the logistics of the program, as we still had people coming in, and we also had about 250 other folks waiting to get out. Travel dept in Denver worked frantically trying to find out options and get status updates. As time progressed, we were able to find out that the airport runway was operational, and that international flights could resume. The Kiwi military flights that were scheduled to fly some of the McMurdo and Scott Base personnel had to be retasked for more important matters, and the US C-17 was used instead to fly the remaining summer staff out of McMurdo on the 27th and the 28th. But this was after several days wait to find out the details.
