February has been a bad month for New Zealand.
And I'm not just talking 2011!
Eighty years ago, in February 1931, a 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck the city of Napier levelling it. 260 innocent people were killed and thousands were injured.
The 6.3 quake that struck Christchurch on February 22 killed at last count - and rising - 150 with some 200 still missing. According to the Prime Minister, it's the deadliest natural disaster in New Zealand's recorded history.
A much stronger 7.1 quake hit the area six months earlier and caused significant damage but no deaths. So often a determining factor with earthquakes for both people and property is location and timing.
In January 2010, 230,000 people died after a magnitude 7.0 earthquake decimated Haiti. Astonishingly, no one died in the larger 7.1 quake that rocked Christchurch here on the other side of the world.
Although the Napier quake of 80 years ago is long gone, the decision to rebuild the city center in the art deco style popular in the early 1930`s has made it a global mecca for tourists.
However, the biggest change came in an altered landscape.
The north east area of Napier tilted downward and the sea rushed in. What was dry land is now a large modern harbour capable of docking large cruise liners and hosting commercial shipping.
The north west part of Napier tilted upwards about three meters and thousands of acres raised above sea level. Hundreds, looking for a safe haven from collapsing buildings, ran to the beach only to find the sea was gone - for good. As the earth pushed up from the sea 80 years ago, a wild mother nature was providing Napier with 5,000 acres of virgin land - now home to the modern new airport.
In the mid 1980s while driving in to the city from the west, I noticed two odd looking structures in the middle of a large field. Cattle were grazing nearby. They looked a lot like the pylons used for air races in the 1930`s - except these were only a few hundred feet apart and had large lights at the top enclosed in glass. My husband, a Kiwi, laughed and said, "They marked the entrance to the harbour before the earthquake altered the landscape."
As is so often the universal truth, a picture is worth a thousands words.
