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Christchurch area, CHC-AKL-HKG
Wednesday morning saw my scheduled job interview, though I had little hope of it going ahead following the quake. We went along to the company to see how they were. Their buildings were closed, save for those working on the clean-up, with some broken windows visible. I ended up exchanging calling cards in the car park with one of their engineers who was helping with the clear up; he said the interview was definitely not going to happen today, and suggested we could reschedule it as a video conference.
Edit: While we didn't take photos of the post-quake city, other people did.
We passed a Europcar depot so called in, seeing as the depot we had hired from (and which was expecting the return) was within the cordoned-off area. They were up and running, but obviously not from the central office; they were relieved to hear that their car was undamaged, were happy to extend the rental by a few hours, and told us not to worry about refilling the tank seeing how most of the petrol stations in town were closed and the rest were experiencing panic buying.
So what to do with the rest of the day? Flights were back on, our evening flight was still operating, and we had a day to pass. Reckoning that Chch could probably do without us getting in the way, we drove out of town and ended up having lunch in the little town of Oxford. However there was only so much scenery we could handle and so went the long way round back to the airport, with the intention of spending some time at the International Antarctic Centre... only to find it was shut due to quake damage. I suppose in hindsight we ought to have guessed it would be, though it was largely business as usual for everything we saw outside of Chch.
We returned the hire car, learning that we had driven 1892 kms (1175 miles) on South Island, then went round to the terminal building. It was a bit chaotic - people sitting all over the place, long queues for the Air NZ helpdesk and for international check-in (which was where we were headed). It turned out that the 747s running the domestic relief flights were operating from the international terminal at CHC - I suppose that's because the domestic gates aren't big enough for them. We passed a little time on the airport wifi, which (like the car parking) had been made temporarily free.
Our flight was domestic, but a feeder service for the Air NZ international flights - so you clear passport control and depart from the international terminal at CHC, and merely transit airside in AKL without even having to change terminals. We were advised to queue from about half past five for an 8:30 flight. So we queued, and we queued, and queued, and queued some more. In fact, apart from faux-motion when the line was split, the queue did not actually move for over two hours, which was a bit worrying.
There was very little information provided as to what was going on; I eventually deduced (by asking careful questions of the occasional staffer who passed) that the international terminal was indeed being used for the domestic relief flights - two 747s and a 777, too big for the domestic terminal to handle - and that they were checking all those passengers in first, doing so with gate agents instead of the check-in kiosks that normally handle domestic flights. (Presumably there was also some sort of logistical hassle in having domestic passengers in the international terminal.) There was much welcome relief when the announcement was made that the airline was going to hold the international flights for us - all of them. (If they didn't, they'd have had to put up a 737ful of people for the night in Auckland. A difficult call for the airline.) Eventually, as the domestic queue started to clear, our line started to move; after we checked in, passports and security were a breeze.
Finally airside, we found that all the duty-free shops and all but one of the food sources were closed, due - surprise surprise - to earthquake damage. It really was genuine damage, too: there were broken and missing drywall panels around the building, some of the ceiling finish was sagging (being prodded by firemen while we were there), and there was a mess on the floor in one of the fooderies where the contents of a chiller cabinet had evidently attempted to hold their position while the building and cabinet moved around them.
The flight was delayed. I overheard the gate agents commenting to each other about what a nightmare the relief flights had been, but how all the staff all over were pulling together really well to ensure they got away. In fact, even though we were past the scheduled departure time, there was not yet any sign of an aircraft for us. Then came the announcement that the flight was landing shortly, but it would have to be taxied over from the domestic terminal and cleaned, that new crew were on their way to operate it but weren't expected until 2140, and (again) that our connecting flights were all being held. Eventually things fell into place and we got underway, but only after we ought to have arrived in Auckland. The crew operated the flight distinctly hammer-and-tongs; a noticeably faster than usual taxi, a rolling take-off directly from it, a fast (high power/high drag) descent into AKL on a direct path, and a slow braking and fast taxi at the other side. They weren't messing around.
I expected a quick off-and-on at Auckland and that we'd be underway quickly. In fact, we were walking through the terminal at 2355, our scheduled onward departure time. However, it wasn't as quick as I'd hoped as we were passed through the transfer rescreening point before they'd let us go to the gate. Why they had to rescreen everybody was not clear; we had departed from the international terminal at CHC and been screened to international standards, including the liquids ban. But rescreen they did, and our later-than-expected 737 caused quite a rush... so much so that passengers connecting with NZ2 (AKL-LAX-LHR) were pulled out of the line and taken to the front. Eventually (am I overusing that word?) we got through screening and walked back to the gate area and got onto our flight.
Despite the delayed departure we still arrived in HKG almost on time, around 0630 local time, for the next phase of our adventure.
Wednesday morning saw my scheduled job interview, though I had little hope of it going ahead following the quake. We went along to the company to see how they were. Their buildings were closed, save for those working on the clean-up, with some broken windows visible. I ended up exchanging calling cards in the car park with one of their engineers who was helping with the clear up; he said the interview was definitely not going to happen today, and suggested we could reschedule it as a video conference.
Edit: While we didn't take photos of the post-quake city, other people did.
We passed a Europcar depot so called in, seeing as the depot we had hired from (and which was expecting the return) was within the cordoned-off area. They were up and running, but obviously not from the central office; they were relieved to hear that their car was undamaged, were happy to extend the rental by a few hours, and told us not to worry about refilling the tank seeing how most of the petrol stations in town were closed and the rest were experiencing panic buying.
So what to do with the rest of the day? Flights were back on, our evening flight was still operating, and we had a day to pass. Reckoning that Chch could probably do without us getting in the way, we drove out of town and ended up having lunch in the little town of Oxford. However there was only so much scenery we could handle and so went the long way round back to the airport, with the intention of spending some time at the International Antarctic Centre... only to find it was shut due to quake damage. I suppose in hindsight we ought to have guessed it would be, though it was largely business as usual for everything we saw outside of Chch.We returned the hire car, learning that we had driven 1892 kms (1175 miles) on South Island, then went round to the terminal building. It was a bit chaotic - people sitting all over the place, long queues for the Air NZ helpdesk and for international check-in (which was where we were headed). It turned out that the 747s running the domestic relief flights were operating from the international terminal at CHC - I suppose that's because the domestic gates aren't big enough for them. We passed a little time on the airport wifi, which (like the car parking) had been made temporarily free.
Our flight was domestic, but a feeder service for the Air NZ international flights - so you clear passport control and depart from the international terminal at CHC, and merely transit airside in AKL without even having to change terminals. We were advised to queue from about half past five for an 8:30 flight. So we queued, and we queued, and queued, and queued some more. In fact, apart from faux-motion when the line was split, the queue did not actually move for over two hours, which was a bit worrying.
There was very little information provided as to what was going on; I eventually deduced (by asking careful questions of the occasional staffer who passed) that the international terminal was indeed being used for the domestic relief flights - two 747s and a 777, too big for the domestic terminal to handle - and that they were checking all those passengers in first, doing so with gate agents instead of the check-in kiosks that normally handle domestic flights. (Presumably there was also some sort of logistical hassle in having domestic passengers in the international terminal.) There was much welcome relief when the announcement was made that the airline was going to hold the international flights for us - all of them. (If they didn't, they'd have had to put up a 737ful of people for the night in Auckland. A difficult call for the airline.) Eventually, as the domestic queue started to clear, our line started to move; after we checked in, passports and security were a breeze.Finally airside, we found that all the duty-free shops and all but one of the food sources were closed, due - surprise surprise - to earthquake damage. It really was genuine damage, too: there were broken and missing drywall panels around the building, some of the ceiling finish was sagging (being prodded by firemen while we were there), and there was a mess on the floor in one of the fooderies where the contents of a chiller cabinet had evidently attempted to hold their position while the building and cabinet moved around them.
The flight was delayed. I overheard the gate agents commenting to each other about what a nightmare the relief flights had been, but how all the staff all over were pulling together really well to ensure they got away. In fact, even though we were past the scheduled departure time, there was not yet any sign of an aircraft for us. Then came the announcement that the flight was landing shortly, but it would have to be taxied over from the domestic terminal and cleaned, that new crew were on their way to operate it but weren't expected until 2140, and (again) that our connecting flights were all being held. Eventually things fell into place and we got underway, but only after we ought to have arrived in Auckland. The crew operated the flight distinctly hammer-and-tongs; a noticeably faster than usual taxi, a rolling take-off directly from it, a fast (high power/high drag) descent into AKL on a direct path, and a slow braking and fast taxi at the other side. They weren't messing around.
I expected a quick off-and-on at Auckland and that we'd be underway quickly. In fact, we were walking through the terminal at 2355, our scheduled onward departure time. However, it wasn't as quick as I'd hoped as we were passed through the transfer rescreening point before they'd let us go to the gate. Why they had to rescreen everybody was not clear; we had departed from the international terminal at CHC and been screened to international standards, including the liquids ban. But rescreen they did, and our later-than-expected 737 caused quite a rush... so much so that passengers connecting with NZ2 (AKL-LAX-LHR) were pulled out of the line and taken to the front. Eventually (am I overusing that word?) we got through screening and walked back to the gate area and got onto our flight.
Despite the delayed departure we still arrived in HKG almost on time, around 0630 local time, for the next phase of our adventure.
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