'QUAKE DESCRIBED

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 333, 21 September 1932, Page 6

'QUAKE DESCRIBED

RUDE AWAKENING ROTORUA RESIDENT GIVES HiS IMPRESSION OF EFFECT ! ! ! STOCK YERY DISTURBED {'It was a terrifying experience, and one which I do not want to undergo again," said Mr. W. H. Waekrow, of ■ Rotorua, when commenting upon the Gisborne earthquake npon his return from the Gisborne district where he was staying at the time of the shake. (I was in Gisborne on Thursday, and went out to Ormond in tlie evening, to stay with friends. We had a rude awakening at about 1.30 a.m. when a sickening jolt rocked the house and brought the chimneys crashing down. My bed catapulted across the room, and the eleetric lamp swung up and struck the ceiling. "Of course, I got out of bed immediately, and went downstairs, (the house was of two storeys). I went outside to see what damage had been dorie, and found that apart from the she.ti j'.-ed chimneys the house which was a wooden oue, had escaped damage. It was very darlc and the night was mude weircl with the bellowing of cows and the bleating of sheep. This pandemonium of sound was heard on all sides, and struck me as being most peculiar. "All the occupants of the liouse were by this time aroused and after a whiie we settled down again on the fioor. About tliree-quarters of an hour later another shock, not so heavy as the first, shook the house, and a further 'quake, followed hy short tremors, \\ as experienced half-an-hour later.

Every Chimney Down , "At daybreak I caught a servicecar from Gisborne, and it was then that I heard from the driver of the damage that had been caused there. T'rom Ormond to Matawai, a distance of about 35 miles, practically every chimney was down. What most surpi:sed me was the faet that the road was in-act, except on some of the higker Murfs, where a few boulders rau come down." Mr. Waekrow mentioned that about 20 minutes after the last shock he heard a distant roar, which became increasingly louder. "I said to myself. "This is the end.' but strange to say it was only a gust of v;ind. which roared around the house for about five minutes, and then passed away." He said, "this was fol-

lowed by a dead cairn." ; He was partieuiarly impressed with ■ the manner in which the wooden j L-uilding resisted Ihe earthquake.. ' Lvery door was hanging as true as | the day it was put up, after the big [ shake, whiie not a sing'Ie window i siifih rt'd damage. Mr. Waekrow exj prcised the opinion that the safest j buildings in country where earthI quakes were lii.ely to occur were those buiit of wood. This had been iliustraied in the Napier earthquake oi 1^31.