Lack of funding prevented crucial Chch faultlines study

Photo / David Fisher

Government scientists failed to carry out a crucial study to find faults under the city of Christchurch due to a lack of funding.

Dr Kelvin Berryman of GNS Science asked for cash to conduct an investigation into whether there would be another significant quake after the September 4 earthquake which changed the landscape of Christchurch forever.

He was giving evidence on the fourth and final day of the first Royal Commission inquiry hearing into the Canterbury earthquakes.

A funding application was lodged with the now mothballed Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Commission (CERC) in December to investigate faults beneath the city, but before the money could be released, "events took over", with the magnitude 6.3 earthquake which struck Christchurch on February 22, killing 182 people.

The funding was never approved and the highly-criticised CERC was replaced by the higher-powered Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority.

The admission came after questioning from Christchurch lawyer Marcus Elliott, counsel assisting the interests of victims' families at the hearings.

Dr Berryman, GNS Natural Hazards Research manager, said how they had applied for funding to CERC.

He said: "Formal discussions were held in December 2010, which laid out the perspectives coming out of issues or the information needs of the science community, post September. One of those proposals was to conduct additional work recognising the area of aftershocks and that some of these were relatively close to Christchurch.

"We were aware there was a lack of information about the sub-surface geology and potential faulting around the city area and we proposed to CERC a project to find out about any sub-surface structures in the city area. It was considered and accepted by the Recovery Commission, but there was no formal feedback from them.

"These were essentially funding proposals given that GNS had diverted between $3 million and $4m to research funding and did not have the resources to complete this study without additional funding.

"It was overtaken by both the Christmas period and, very rapidly overtaken by February 22. The application was not granted and, I guess, left in limbo."

Yesterday (Wednesday) GNS admitted information was withheld from the public over the possibility of an earthquake larger than the magnitude 7.1 September 4 shake, on advice from social scientists scared for the "traumatised" city's collective mental health.

He said they didn't want to "alarm unnecessarily" - and today told the hearing that their decision was justified, since the event has not yet occurred.

Dr Berryman said: "In those early days, there was a statistical chance of an earthquake even bigger than the main shock.

"At the time, in a traumatised and very challenging situation in the city that very small percentage was not withheld - but it was not also advocated in the sense that it would be a very frightening proposition."

Dr Berryman said despite all of the earthquake research that has been carried out and the resultant scientific predictions, they still didn't know what will happen next.

He admitted that despite everything, "an earthquake sequence will do its own thing."

The 'seismicity' hearing came to a close at midday today with the next hearing, on the topic of 'soils', to be heard next week.

The commission is examining the cause of building collapses, especially during the February 6.3 magnitude quake which claimed 182 lives, and how such a disaster can be avoided in future

The commission is set to hear evidence until next March before presenting its findings to the government by April 11.

Evidence on the collapse of the PGC building, where 18 people died, is scheduled to start on November 28, while the CTV building, which killed 115 people, is down to be heard in March.