22.04.11. Grey & blue portaloos opp IR bldg, Cashel St / Madras St crossing, red zone, national state of emergency.
Cashel St / Madras St crossing: Southeast corner: St Paul's Trinity Pacific Presbyterian Church, was damaged in the 4 September 2010 quake, scaffolded before the 22 February 2011 quake & demolished post 22 February 2011 quake, leaving a foundation-hole, foundation-stones around the nave & apse, a pile of tangled scaffolding, stacked creamy drums from Oamaru whitestone columns & roof-beams for recycling.
On the diagonally opposite northwest corner, the seven-storey CTV collapsed during the 22 February 2011 quake, the lift-shaft stood burning while people were trapped in fallen rubble.
22.04.11. Steel mesh fence cordon. Feb 22 quake destroyed CTV bldg, Cashel St / Madras St crossing, red zone, national state of emergency
Good Friday, 22.04.11, I visited CTV ruin for the first time post 22 February 2011 quake & was there at the exact time CTV multi-storey collapsed two months before. CTV ruin was still behind the red-zone, steel-mesh-fence-cordon which stopped people approaching the demolition- site. NZDF-soldiers & cops were elsewhere during the National State-of-Emergency. Several people gawped the CTV ruin: families, cyclists, walkers, photographers.
Demolishers left the scorched CTV lift-shaft, concrete-rubble on a concrete-slab, a heap of flowers & two teddy-bears, Cashel St / Madras St & graffiti, including USAR / TF graffiti, on brick-walls near the lift-shaft.
CTV ruin would soon be completely demolished, leaving many unanswered questions why CTV multi-storey collapsed? Later the Royal Commission of Inquiry would try to answer those questions.
22.04.11. Holden Blackwells carpark view, IR bldg left, Feb 22 quake damaged Hotel Grand Chancellor centre, ruined CTV bldg right, Cashel St / Madras St crossing, red zone, national state of emergency. CTV ruin, Hotel Grand Chancellor & Holden Blackwells would be demolished
26.04.11. M4.1 aftershock, 10.07pm, depth 8km, within 5km of Lyttelton (GeoNet). It trembled pot-plant, fern leaves in our lounge, a sign the quake was M4 or more.
*Trekked Cashel St / Madras St crossing. 29 snaps.
Coda:
Fri 10.02.12. The Press would report the long awaited Department of Building & Housing report on why CTV multi-storey collapsed:
The report stated CTV multi-storey collapsed due to horizontal shaking, CTV not being up to building-code / standard when built in 1986, that weak, brittle, non-ductile, concrete-columns collapsed, worsened by asymmetrical shear-walls causing the building to twist while collapsing.
Thus CTV multi-storey was badly built by a fake construction-manager, weak, with columns like raw spaghetti, which collapsed in the M6.3 quake. Shame on the architects, designers, Council-consenters, engineers, builders. Excuses about massive vertical-accelerations in the quake were expedient.
The challenge for Council & engineers in Christchurch & elsewhere in NZ, was to find poorly constructed buildings pronto & make them safe, or demolish.
Fob-off for families of the dead: Later in 2012, the Royal Commission of Inquiry would ascertain in great detail why CTV multi-storey collapsed. Denialist engineers & fake construction-manager were remiss.
After the 2016 cop "Investigation" into CTV multi-storey collapse, cops would say there wasn't enough evidence to charge engineers. So much for justice! Did cops ever investigate CTV-rubble stored at Bottle Lake Excusion-Zone?
2025. Fourteen years post 22 February 2011 quake, neither the CTV building-owner, nor engineers, nor construction-manager had been held accountable for the CTV collapse.
Content & pics Copyright Mark JS Esslemont.
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