some of the november 22nd earthquakes, from http://www.christchurchquakemap.co.nz/
As I write this I’m on the schedule to fly south to McMurdo tomorrow morning, weather permitting. After taking care of my business at the CDC earlier today (see my last post) I had a quick lunch (caesar salad with venison) and spent a couple of hours writing reference letters for students. After that I really needed a little bit of an escape, so I went to the movies; specifically a late afternoon matinee of the latest “Potterverse” film, “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them”. And before any of you with children utter “how dare you go to a kids movie without your kids” you should know I got explicit permission from my wife, so I could tell her if it was suitable for our 8-year-old daughter Scout (unfortunately there’s several scenes that are probably too scary for her).
I was surprised how much I enjoyed Fantastic Beasts. I wasn’t a huge fan of the later Harry Potter movies because they were overly dark and poorly-paced, but this one I liked a lot. There’s no comparing the Fantastic Beasts moving to the book; the movie is a completely different story. The acting was superb, particularly the two male leads, the sound track is fantastic, and the special effects definitely add to the story. It helped that I watched the movie in great comfort in an almost empty theatre.
It’s not much of a spoiler to say that a running magical battle makes up a lot of the climax of the movie (it’s the Potterverse, after all). But in the middle of the battle I realized there was more going on – the theatre was shaking and it wasn’t from the barrage of sound. It was an earthquake, one that continued to shake for a long time. There were five people in the theatre, and after about two minutes of continuous shaking, two left quickly, I went and stood in the doorway, and an older couple just stayed in their seats and watched the movie.
The shaking is still going on. I’ve felt a few earthquakes before, but they all took the form of a jolt that peaked in a few short seconds and then decayed away equally quickly. These just kept shaking and rolling, with a period of about 1/3 of a second, and I now appreciate how continuously shaking ground gives you a feeling of helplessness.
You can see this sequence of quakes at the amazing Christchurch earthquake website: http://www.christchurchquakemap.co.nz/; the earthquakes I felt in the theatre began about 18:10 (on November 22) and the shaking was almost continuous for an hour. The largest individual quake was 5.7 magnitude, but there were a lot of 4+ magnitude quakes in there too. They occur only 50 km or so from Christchurch, in a tight area distant from the recent quakes near Hamner Springs and Kaikoura.There’s a good story at the Christchurch press: http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/86758316/christchurch-shaken-by-severe-earthquake.
Feeling a little bit shaken, no pun intended.
-Posted by Ralph from Christchurch.