On the morning of February 22nd, Christchurch New Zealand was completely diminished to nothing but rubble when a 6.3 magnitude earthquake shook the city. Just one day after the earthquake many are beginning the process of finding those who are missing. Cheers erupt spontaneously as people are pulled out alive from the rubble. However, many cheers are quickly silenced by the realization of buildings holding many people are nothing but piles of steel and cement. As of right now the confirmed death toll is at 75 but one buildign that has not been searched through is a large hotel. Police believe that there could be as many as 100 people dead from the hotel collapsing on top of them. As the search continues for survivors many of the rescuers has resorted to extreme measures such as amputating victims in or to get them out. One rescuer said that it is a necessity in order to save people. On top of this whole situation, 80% of the city is without water so people have resorted to collecting rainfall which is working well considering it has been raining the past two days. The city has also put in place rules that people can't be out ion the streets after 6:30pm because the city is just that unstable.
It seems like these past few years have been really notorious for devastating earthquakes. So it makes you wonder whats going on that is causing all of these deadly earthquakes to occur all over the world, not to mention is the US the next in line to receive one of these earthquakes. Natural disasters such as these really test just how well the country can work together to redevelope their country. And not to sound like a pessimist but right now I really don't know how the US would react to a disaster like this. I mean with all the debt that we have right now, how would we be able to pay for the rebuilding process? Here in America we can still see the aftermath of Hurrican Katrina and that happened back in 2005. Knowing that alone would make you think that there would be no way to clean up, especially with all the debt we have at the moment. If a natural disaster like this earthquake happened to us in America it would be the ultimate test for the strength of our nation.
I agree with you Katie! Sometimes I wonder how our country would react to a devastating natural disaster. I don't underestimate the power we have as a nation, just the money and resources. We came together on September 11th, and for the Katrina hurricane, but do we have the money to keep rebuilding such large things? Let's hope nothing bad happens!
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