Earthquakes are not uncommon in New Zealand, where the Pacific and Indo-Australian tectonic plates meet. There is also quite some volcanic activity, both today and in the past.

There were earthquakes near Christchurch in 2010 and 2011, the one in February 2011 being particularly violent, killing almost 200 people. Here in Lyttelton, we could see the damage that remained after five years. Some buildings could not be restored because the ground they were built on was now considered unsafe. Photos of some historical buildings were put up in front of the place where they stood, as a reminder of the earthquake. The same situation prevailed all over the Christchurch earthquake area, where large tracts of land had to remain unused.