Day 6, 3pm – inside the Christchurch cordon

My cleaning was interrupted when we lost power again at 10.35am.  Having had it for two days we’d become used to the privilege.  Within half an hour there were several Orion men working on the problem:

Orion men working to restore our power

A Search and Rescue team broke into every one of the dozen flats opposite us.  I told one of them that everyone there had been okay after the earthquake but they’d moved out after they were yellow-stickered.  He said they have to check every room of every building – this is part of the grid search.  If they can go through a window they do, but in the flats they had to open the doors with crowbars, and they don’t re-secure them.  This team was from Nelson Rescue in LA County – the guy told me he’d been part of the recovery after Hurricane Katrina, and they’d had to break doors down there too.

Search and Rescue Team, taken from our front window as they headed round the corner

Seeing the SAR operation makes me nervous about leaving the cottage in case we come home to find it open.  I wonder when they’ll do our side of the street.  After they’d disappeared round the corner a man came on a bicycle and went into the flats.  I wondered whether he might be a thief and considered going across to ask what he was doing.  One SAR man came back so I went across to tell him, the “intruder”appeared and I recognised him as one of the tenants.  He had just rung his landlady to get the flats re-secured.  This tenant had left his phone number on his door, but the SAR ignored that – I guess it’s all part of their duty.

DJ’s icecream van came by and gave the Orion men ice creams – a kind idea on a warm day.  If I’d been out on the street I could have had one too.

There’s a Two Degrees cellphone tower in the Bridge Club car park.  After the power went out a van arrived.

Two Degrees Serviceman

Without power the tower will function for about eight hours on battery, then it needs help from a generator.  This man had come to start the generator to provide power for crucial commuinication.  I told him I’m a two degrees customer and grateful for his help.

Power came back at 12.25pm.  Apparently a cable had blown.  They found another that hadn’t yet been ‘enlivened’, enlivened it, and re-routed our supply.  In between all this we’ve been chatting with neighbours and answering phone calls, so we’d hardly missed the power.  There’ll be time to vacuum tomorrow.

“There’s lots been going on today.
A boring life round here?  No way!”